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ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 



A VIEW OF THE ABSOLUTE RELIGION, BASED ON PHILO- 
SOPHICAL PRINCIPLES AND THE DOCTRINES 
OF THE BIBLE. 



BY 

THOMAS C. "UPHAM, D.D., LL.D. 

AUTHOR OF 

"LIFE AND RELIGIOUS OPINIONS OF MADAME DE GUYON,' 

"A SYSTEM OF MENTAL PHILOSOPHY,'" "THE 

INTERIOR OR HIDDEN LIFE," ETC., ETC. 



' 




NEW YORK: J 

G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS, 

FOURTH AVE. & TWENTY-THIRD STREET. 
1373- 



J57?/V 
.Us* 



Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1873, by 

THOMAS C. UPHAM, 
in the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington. 



Wm. McCrea & Co., Stereotypers, Langk, Little & Hill.man, 

PRINTERS, 

Newburgh, N. Y. 10s TO ]U WoosTER street, n. y. 



TO THE READER. 

This Volume, entitled the Absolute Religion, 
comprises some of the unpublished writings of 
Thomas C. Upham, deceased. An amanuensis had 
been engaged to copy his manuscripts, written with 
pencil, the day preceding an attack of paralysis, May 
20th, 1871. This paralysis, causing blindness of one 
eye, and general debility, rendered him unable to 
give any farther attention to the work. A second 
attack of paralysis, as he was rising from his bed on 
the morning of March 10th, 1872, terminated his 
life April 2d 1872, six o'clock a. m., at the age of 
seventy three years. During these three weeks of 
prostration he was unable to articulate distinctly. 
The only connected sentence clearly understood is 
this : " My spirit is with God." 

Several chapters of the work were left partly 
written, and of other chapters, only the headings 
and leading thoughts remain. The fact that the 
author did not complete the work, must be received 
as an apology for any lack of completeness, in the 
outline, arrangement and finish of the work. The 
aim of the author seems to be to unfold and to har- 
monize as far as may be, religious views and opin- 
ions, by explaining them on the basis of a sound 



IV TO THE READER. 

philosophy, in the hope that some minds might be 
benefited by such a philosophical statement. The 
aim is a great one. And the philosophic and chris- 
tian man who loves to see God in providence, and 
God in man, and religion a reasonable service, will 
appreciate this effort of one who made the study 
of man in his mental powers and capacities, the one 
great study of his life ; and whose highest aim, in 
every practical way, was to benefit by word and 
deed his brother man. 

The responsibility of issuing such a work, which 
the author did not complete, and which he did not 
himself revise, is only balanced by the desire that 
good may be accomplished however imperfect the 
work. 

The following sentences are an extract from his 
preface to " Divine Union " a work published by 
him in 1857, and are appropriate here. 

" In writing this work I have no private or party 

interests to subserve, but only wish to do, what I 

may seem, in the providence of God called to do, 

for that cause of Christ, of God, and humanity, 

which is dearer to me than anything else. And 

this is a consolation which always attends me, — the 

full belief that the truth will live and do the good 

appropriate to it, and that all error will and must 

die." 

PHCEBE LORD UPHAM. 
New York, May, 1873. 



CONTENTS. 



«•> 



I. 

PAGE 

The Absolute Religion considered in connection with 
the Doctrines of the Bible, especially the Teach- 
ings of Christ g 

II. 

The Personality of God . 20 

III. 
God as Life 32 

IV. 
Identity of Life and Love 38 

V. 

God as Unity and Duality .45 

VI. 

The Son of God 68 

VII. 

Necessity and Possibility of a Divine Manifestation . 79 

VIII. 

Christ as the Fulfilment of the Law .... 88 



IX. 

The Second or New Birth 



95 



V444- CONTENTS. 

X. 

PAGE 

Relation of the First to the Second Birth . . . 102 



XL 

Relation of Moral Evil to Freedom, and its Remedy . 116 



XII. 
The Divine Purposes 128 



XIII. 
Universality of Religious Thought 138 

XIV. 
Harmony of Religiour Opinions 14V 

XV. 
Optimism 154 

XVI. 
The Objective and Subjective in Religion . . ... 163 

XVII. 
Unities and Diversities 169 

XVIII. 
View of the Doctrine of Sacrifices 179 

XIX. 
Growth of the Idea of God 185 

XX. 

Of the Satisfaction of Divine Justice . . . . 19 1 



VII 

CONTENTS. 4^ 

XXI. 

PAGE 

The Doctrine of a Judgment affirmed by Absolute 

Religion 195 

XXII. 
The Doctrine of Heaven and Hell 199 

XXIII. 

Of the Sin against the Holy Ghost, or the Sin which 

cannot be forgiven 209 

XXIV. 
Prayer in its Relation to the Absolute Religion . . 215 

XXV. 
Relation of Faith to Salvation 222 



XXVI. 
Divine Influences 228 



XXVII. 

Explanation of Existing Practical Methods of Teach- 
ing _ 235 

XXVIII. 
Contrasted Views of the Selfish and Essential Life . 242 

XXIX. 

Mediatorialism as a Universal and Practical Principle . 253 

XXX. 

Explanation of Terms Regarding the Essential Life . 262 



VIII 

^ CONTENTS. 

XXXI. 

* PAGE 

Evidences of the Existence of the Essential Life . . 268 

XXXII. 

The Essential Life Reaches to all Existences . . 280 

XXXIII. 
The Power of the Essential Life 288 

XXXIV. 

Locality of God and the Moment — Personal Experi- 
ence 297 



1 



Absolute Religion . 



CHAPTER I. 



The Absolute Religion considered in connection with 
the doctrines of the Bible, especially the teachings 
of Christ. 

I. It is not difficult for the reflecting mind to 
see, in the currents of thought which characterize 
the present period, a tendency to bring into notice, 
and to give emphasis to what is called the Absolute 
Religion. Many persons, who would not willingly 
be regarded as irreligious, have expressed a desire 
for a religion founded upon the exercise of reason 
and upon philosophical principles, and not exclu- 
sively or chiefly upon authority. The utterance 
which is heard in this direction, is every day grow- 
ing louder and more imperative. It is the expres- 
sion of the views and feelings of persons whose sin- 
cerity cannot well be doubted ; and who, at least, 
have a claim upon our respect for the intellectual 



I0 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

ability which they have often manifested. It is an 
utterance, therefore, whether addressed to us as 
Christians, or merely as men of thought and philo- 
sophic inquiry, which cannot wisely be allowed to go 
unheeded. 

2. The first inquiry which claims our attention, 
is, What are we to understand by the Absolute 
Religion ? It is perhaps proper to say, that the an- 
swer to this question will be likely to develop itself 
more fully and satisfactorily in the course of the dis- 
cussions which are to follow. And yet a few words 
on the subject may properly be said here. In the 
first place it may be remarked in general terms and 
without going minutely into reasons, that the Abso- 
lute Religion is that religion which, harmonizing 
with the truths and requisitions of God on the one 
hand, and with the nature of man as related to God 
on the other, is necessarily as wide in its extent and 
its application as humanity itself; — a religion which 
neither limited by geographical boundaries, nor de- 
pendent for its existence on civil and political enact- 
ments, is the inheritance of all men equally, what- 
ever their name or place or condition, by virtue of 
their common nature. In other words, it is a reli- 
gion which is universal. 

In the second place, it is that religion which 
finding its subjective expression in ideas rather than 



ABSOL UTE RELIGION. x i 

in sensations, and in those ideas which are fundamen- 
tal in themselves and in their relations, vindicates its 
claim to Absoluteness, because it is unchangeable ; 
and is therefore the religion, not only of all men and 
all nations but of all time and all ages. That reli- 
gion, which is found to be merely an incident of a na- 
tion's or people's history, and which passes away 
with the transition of the temporary circumstances 
on which it is founded, fails to present any just claim 
to this character of immutableness and universality. 
The Absolute Religion is something very different 
from this. Founded in the nature and constitution 
of things, but harmonizing with the thought and 
sustained by the power of the highest Intelligence 
in the universe, and being revealed to human appre- 
hension by means of fundamental and universal ideas, 
which speak inwardly and intuitionally and with a 
voice of authority, it is necessarily a religion which 
exists everywhere, and exists forever. No antagon- 
isms of the changeable and the finite, no chance nor 
change, which mars the face of human affairs, nor 
hardness of heart, nor slowness of belief, can triumph 
over the truth and supremacy which are its basis. 

3. Characterized by universality in its extent and 
application, and by permanency in duration, it has al- 
so this distinctive and paramount feature, that it car- 
ries with it a binding and controlling obligation upon 



12 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

the thoughts, feelings and actions of all men and of 
all moral beings, by a virtue or power which is lodged 
in itself, and not by means or in virtue of any power, 
authority or command outside of itself. It may be 
aided by such outside influences but is not neces- 
sarily dependent upon them. Its authority is its 
own ; its word is law. It may not be out of place to 
make the explanatory remark here, that there is a 
great difference between a thing considered in its 
own nature, and its announcement or revelation. 
The thing or object in question presents itself in one 
aspect ; the announcement of it in another. For in- 
stance, the announcement of the Absolute Religion 
may have occurred at a particular period or in a par- 
ticular country, in the era of Moses, or in the era of 
Christ, at Sinai or at Jerusalem, at Rome or Athens, 
or in other periods and in other countries ; but the 
thing itself, the religious truth, involved by a sort of 
eternal generation in the great facts of the universe, 
has no time or place, no beginning or end. 

4. Such, in general terms is the Absolute Reli- 
gion. This religion has had its interpreters in all 
ages of the world ; men who, with different degrees 
of mental illumination, have attempted to give ex- 
pression to the great religious thought, written in 
the hieroglyphics of universal nature ; — Socrates, 
Plato, Cicero, Seneca, Confucius, Zoroaster, Sakya- 



ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 



13 



Mouni, and many others, who have seen some- 
thing of the great interior light, which is destined in 
the progress of its rising to illuminate all lands, and 
to harmonize all moral and religious separations. I 
allude to these men who seem to me to have been 
to some extent the subjects of a divine guidance, in 
no lightness of spirit, but with a sincere reverence 
and gratitude. Each in his degree and place, and 
in reference to his age and country, may be regarded 
as having a divine mission, and as being in some im- 
portant sense the minister of God. Nevertheless 
there came in the fullness of time a Man who was 
greater than these. If I have studied him aright in 
what has been left us of his life and doctrines, the 
great teacher of the Absolute Religion, and stand- 
ing far above all others in the measurement of his 
insight, is Jesus of Nazareth. The highest and most 
reliable expression of the Absolute Religion is found 
as it seems to me in his wonderful words. 

5. The object of the present work, undertaken 
with much mistrust of myself but in the hope that 
it will be found to harmonize with the truth, is not 
only to announce some of the leading doctrines of 
the Absolute Religion, but to show their identity 
with the doctrines of Christ. The religion of Christ, 
which is only another name for the principles involv- 
ed in the teachings of Christ, is the Absolute Reli- 



14 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

gion ; because having incarnated itself in Christ and 
thus shown its divine beauty in the human form, it 
henceforth belongs to man, not perhaps in the tem- 
porary and changing incidents of his history, but to 
man in his essential and universal nature, and there- 
fore is the religion of humanity. The religion of 
Christ is the Absolute Religion because, though it 
may be said in its personal applications to grow up 
and to put forth the buds and flowers of feeling, the 
rich and beautiful experiences of emotions and af- 
fections, it nevertheless has its root in the deepest 
thought, and is both grounded in, and harmonizes 
with, unchangeable intuitions. The religion of 
Christ is the Absolute Religion, though man is its 
object, and is also, in the exercise of his powers of 
perception and reasoning, the appointed and neces^ 
sary instrument of its development, yet being found- 
ed in the nature and constitution of things, and thus 
being beyond measurements of time, it synchronizes 
with God himself in its origin and continuance, and 
goes step by step with the divine authority in the 
assertion of its universal empire. 

6. I am aware, that the high claims now put 
forth in favor of the religion of Christ, considered in 
its relation to the absolute truth, are not always al- 
lowed by that class of thinkers and inquirers to whom 
allusion was made in the beginning of the chapter. 



ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 



15 



And what is more, they are not always, and perhaps 
not generally insisted on by those who are distinct- 
ively and truly known as Christians. Not unfre- 
quently the Christian says, as if conscious of his ina- 
bility to stand firm in the great battle of thought, 
and willing to find the first refuge that presents 
itself, that the religion of Christ, standing on a basis 
peculiar to itself, may be regarded as above and 
beyond reason. I confess that I hesitate in the 
acceptance of such expressions. So far from this 
being the correct view, there is a sense undoubtedly, 
in which it may be affirmed without presumption, 
that there is nothing above reason ; neither God nor 
the creatures of God ; neither men nor angels ; 
neither finite nor Infinite. If it be admitted that 
God exists, it is still true, that he is not available to 
us as an existence, and is not known to us as an ex- 
istence, and his existence cannot be logically affirm- 
ed and accepted, except through the instrumentality 
of perception and reasoning. If indeed by reason 
be meant that sad semblance of reason, which by its 
own action is separated from, and is not enlightened 
and aided by contact with the everlasting truth ; in 
other words, that form of reason or semblance of rea- 
son, which in being separated from the great Source 
and Guide of all our faculties is perverted by igno- 
rance, prejudice, and passion, then the matter pre- 



1 6 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

sents itself in another aspect, and is entitled to an- 
other answer. But reason in the true sense, reason 
in the greatness of its intuitional, as well as its rela- 
tional and inductive movement, reason such as God 
is able to incarnate inspirationally in the thought 
and intellect of man, has nothing above it. True 
reason is God's highest thought ; it holds a position 
which it cannot change ; it sustains an office which 
it cannot abnegate ; and the whole universe is not 
only dependent upon it for its revelation as an object 
of knowledge, but in all its coming progress accepts 
its aid, and marches in harmony with it. 

7. — Let it be understood furthermore, that we 
have no controversy with much of that which is 
known in the history of human knowledge under 
the name of philosophy. The philosophers have 
had their time of affirmation; and undoubtedly they 
have said instructive things on a great variety of 
subjects. They have felt at liberty to speak with 
boldness on the subject now before us ; and some- 
times with a smile of incredulity and even of opposi- 
tion on their lips, as if it were a thing impossible, 
that the peasant of Nazareth, the man who was cru- 
cified, could hold up a light in the presence of the 
world's philosophic thought and culture. Neverthe- 
less the child of the humble Judean mother made the 
attempt. We read that when he was only twelve 



ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 



17 



years of age, the inspiration from the heavens was 
so strong upon him and his heart was so full, that 
he entered into this great controversy. And even 
then his understanding and answers were matters of 
astonishment. But the hand of the mother, who 
was chosen to bring him within the sphere of hu- 
manity, withdrew him from the contest. Her heart 
had prophetic intimations of the future ; but the 
time had not yet come. He dwelt in Nazareth, and 
with his heart open to the influx of the truth, he 
" increased in wisdom and stature, and in favor with 
God and man.'' And when in the maturity of man- 
hood he came again into the field, his opponents 
met him with all the appliances and aids of human 
learning and wisdom ; but ignorant of that divine 
philosophy which is baptized from the heavens, and 
therefore greatly disordered and defeated in the ar- 
gument, they stopped the discussion by nailing Him 
to the Cross. But there is something in the man of 
truth which can never die. He passed on. In the 
language of the Scriptures, he went up on high. 
And philosophy, not understanding the things which 
are seen by faith and not by sight, looked here and 
there but could not find Him. 

The teacher of Nazareth, dead but living, no 
longer a child but clothed with heavenly manhood, 
and who teaches by means of inspirations and infiu- 



1 8 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

ences wrought in the great school of the human 
heart, still claims his right to be heard. He is still 
a teacher of the Absolute Religion. 

8. — It remains to be added, which I think will 
naturally occur to the reader, that the doctrine of 
the Absolute Religion pertains to essentials and not 
to the mere incidents of things ; to the principles 
rather than the form ; and not so much to institu- 
tions and ceremonies, as to that which underlies 
them. 

It deals Avith those things, as we have already 
seen, which from their nature bear the stamp of per 
manency ; things which are because they cannot fail 
to be ; things which exist because non-existence is 
an impossibility ; whereas ceremonies, outward forms, 
institutions which have beginnings, changes and end, 
and mere outward arrangements and incidents of 
any kind, which are the result of specific and positive 
enactment, are temporary and unsettled in their na- 
ture and are short in their duration. And therefore, 
it will not be surprising, if there are many things 
which will not be noticed in what follows ; and sim- 
ply because they fall out of the natural line of our 
remarks, and receive their appropriate attention in 
other connections and with other methods of treat- 
ment. 

9. — The work which I have undertaken is de- 



ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 



19 



signed to be pacific in its spirit, and is not necessarily 
controversial. It does not at all follow, because a 
writer deals with a controverted subject, that his dis- 
cussion of such a subject must necessarily be harsh 
and controversial in its spirit or aspect. In what I 
have to say, I shall make but little reference to names 
and persons, and parties. I deal with principles 
rather than with men. And it is not beyond my 
hope that the truth will be found, and that charity 
will be unbroken. 



CHAPTER II. 

The Personality of God. 

i.-^-God exists. The existence of God is a doc- 
trine of the Absolute Religion. It is true there are 
said to be Atheists. Perhaps there may be individ- 
uals, not very many in number, to whom that name 
of error and sadness may apply. As long as great 
perversions of the human mind are possible, varying 
from the numerous forms of temporary disturbance 
to partial or total insanity, it is mot unphilosophical 
to suppose that atheism, in the case of a few indi- 
viduals is a possibility. But I know not that there 
are atheistic communities or peoples. Humanity, 
into which we are to search for the development of 
principles, is represented by masses. The masses of 
mankind, as they are found associated in large socie- 
ties and communities, have never rejected the idea 
of a God. No historian, from the days of Herodotus 
and Thucydides, has furnished us the records of an 



THE PERSONALITY OF GOD. 2 I 

atheistic nation. We are justified therefore in ta- 
king the position, that the idea of a God belongs to 
humanity. As a product of intellectualism, it finds 
its origin in part in processes of reasoning founded 
on the perceptions, but has a still closer alliance with 
the intuitions ; and the Being whom it reveals com- 
mands by a law of our nature, the reverential and 
loving homage of the heart. So clearly is the doc- 
trine of God's existence inscribed upon the works of 
outward nature, as they are interpreted by the hu- 
man intellect, so strongly is this doctrine affirmed 
by the interior convictions and intuitions, and so 
necessary is it in response to the yearnings of the 
human heart, that I cannot feel the necessity of en- 
tering into argument in relation to it. I take it for 
granted. 

2. — But there is a matter, connected with the di- 
vine existence, which cannot well be omitted, and 
which is of great importance. I refer to the 

O 1 

doctrine of the Personality of God. Various circum- 
stances have brought this question into prominence, 
and justify giving attention to it. Within a few 
years no small number of writers of acknowledged 
learning and ability have greatly disturbed the tra- 
ditional belief as well as the religious hopes and con- 
solations of a large portion of the Christian world, 
by affirming and attempting to prove the imperson- 



22 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

ality of the Divine Being. In accordance with our 
plan of inquiry we shall endeavor to show, that the 
Personality of God is taught by the absolute method ; 
and that the teachings of the Absolute Religion, in 
this particular as well as in others of a fundamentally 
religious nature, are in harmony with the Christian 
doctrine. 

3. — It cannot well be doubted, that the person- 
ality of God is one of the doctrines contained in the 
teachings of Christ. It is difficult to see how he 
could address God as his Father, and in terms im- 
plying the greatest veneration and love, without be- 
lieving in the Personality of God. 

When, in the trials and sorrows of the Cross, he 
prayed, " Father forgive them for they know not 
what they do ;'' and when in the final agony of his 
spirit he said, " my God, my God, why hast thou 
forsaken me," it cannot well be supposed that he 
believed he was praying to an abstraction, or to a 
spiritual generalization, or a great undefined princi- 
ple of life, instead of a percipient Being, who in the 
mental or spiritual sense had ears to hear, and a 
heart to feel. We cannot doubt, that the careful 
readers of the New Testament, in view of what is 
there said having a bearing upon the subject now 
before us, fully and earnestly accept the idea, as the 
only one which can be reasonably entertained, that 



THE PERSONALITY OF GOD. 



23 



Jesus believed in the divine personality. This won- 
derful Being, of whom we shall have occasion to 
speak more fully hereafter, had a heart that wor- 
shipped. His intellectual powers, which are some- 
times overshadowed and concealed by the manifes- 
tations of his great goodness, revealed and identi- 
fied the object of his worship ; and his loving heart, 
which added emotion to perception, accepted the 
revelation and yielded its homage. But affirm that 
God is not a personal being, only an underlying 
principle or causative force which permeates all ex- 
istences and develops itself in all the forms of ex- 
istence, without the intelligence and responsibility 
which are implied in personality and only by means 
of fixed and inexorable law, and from that moment 
it is intuitionally evident, that there is no revela- 
tion of an object of worship because no such object 
exists. And worship itself, which is so obviously 
one of the leading characteristics of the inward life 
of Christ, necessarily ceases, because there is no ob- 
ject to which it can attach itself. 

4. — But philosophy, or something which goes 
under that great though often perverted name, has 
in these later times taken a different view. Those 
who are acquainted with the speculations and sug- 
gestions on this subject, associated, more or less dis- 
tinctly with the names of Helvetius, Diderot, Con- 



24 



ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 



dorcet, D'Alembert, Hume, Gibbon, Fichte, Hegel, 
Compte, Herbert Spencer, Mills, Strauss, Feuerbach 
and others, know well how confidently God has 
been announced as a principle of activity and causa- 
tion, but without the recognized attribute of a per- 
son ; in other words as a great spiritual or psychical 
energy, pervading all things that exist, and holding 
a fixed and necessary relation to results, but with- 
out a distinct and available responsibility, and with- 
out even knowing or having any interest in know- 
ing what the results of its own activity shall be. It 
is painful to know how widely such speculations 
have affected the thoughts and feelings of men. 
But this doctrine of God, which analyzed to its re- 
sults is practically the annihilation of God, is a very 
different thing from the simple, sublime, and truly 
philosophic idea of God, which is justly understood 
as holding a place in the doctrines of Christ. 

The God of the Bible, from the earliest to the 
latest portion of its announcements is a personal 
God. All that is said of God in that great treasury 
of thought, including the personal teachings ol 
Christ, with all its affirmations of his eternity and 
universality, recognizes and emphasizes the great 
and essential fact of his personality. 

And we cannot hesitate in saying, that a true 
philosophy, when applied to the doctrines of reli- 



THE PERSONALITY OF GOD. 



25 



gion, in other words that the Absolute Religion, or 
Religion developed in the highest and truest hu- 
man thought and feeling, is on the side of the bibli- 
cal teachings. 

5. — And let us now look at the subject in a little 
different aspect, with a view as briefly as possible, 
to bring it to the test of facts and reason. Before we 
can either affirm or deny the personality of God, we 
must first make personality itself, separate from the 
being to whom it attaches and of whom it is predi- 
cated, the subject of our thought. It is at this point 
that we detect what seems to us the beginning of a 
great error. 

Personality is not merely a name ; nor is it merely 
an idea. In order to know fully what it is, we must 
go back from the name to the idea ; and from the 
idea or thought to the fact or truth which the idea 
represents. The name is merely an aid to the 
thought ; an auxiliary or help in the use of the 
thought. The thought or idea of personality, which 
arises necessarily in the mind under the appropriate 
circumstances of its origin, is justly regarded as a 
simple or elementary idea ; and as such it may be 
admitted that it is not susceptible of that logical 
process which is known as a definition. And yet 
not being what Mr. Locke would call an illusive or 
chimerical idea, but one harmonizing with the truth 



2 6 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

of things, it involves and affirms to our interior con- 
victions and belief the fact or verity of the thing to 
which it relates. And hence, in connection with the 
necessary laws of mental action, we have a basis, and 
we cannot get it in any other way, for affirming the 
fact of personality. We say for instance in relation 
to ourselves and say it without hesitation that we 
are personal beings. And when we thus come to 
personality itself, in distinction from the idea of it ; 
when we reach the verity or reality of the fact in 
distinction from its intellectual representation, if it 
should happen that definitions in the usual logical 
form fail to make it more clearly known, on account 
of its interior and elementary nature, it is still both 
clear in itself as a matter of internal and intuitional 
revelation, and we can also obtain to some extent 
additional knowledge of what it is by the indirect 
process of indicating what it is not. 

For instance, personality, in distinction from the 
idea or intellectual representation of personality, and 
considered as a fact or verity actually existing and 
of which it can be affirmed that it is, is not identical 
with existence, nor is it identical with knowledge, 
nor with power, nor with activity, nor with expan- 
sion. It may have its important relations with any 
or all of them ; but it requires to be kept distinct, 
both in its idea through which it is represented to 



THE PERSONALITY OF GOD. 



2/ 



us, and also in its fact or realization. A Being, sep- 
arate in the mere fact of existence from other beings, 
who has actually powers of perception and affection, 
and who can not only know and judge and feel, but 
has the volitional power which can carry his judg- 
ments and feelings to their appropriate issues, has 
necessarily a personality, whether his susceptibilities 
of knowledge be greater or less, or whether the mere 
extent or expansion of his existence be greater or 
less, or whether he comes within the limits of our 
comprehension or not. The convictions of the hu- 
man mind, arising by their own necessary laws of 
being, require us in such a case to affirm the fact or 
realization of personality, and enable us to say with- 
out any misgivings, that we have before us a per- 
sonal being. We have not merely the idea of per- 
sonality, which is a matter of interior or subjective 
experience and nothing more ; but we have before 
us the fact of personality, in its outward or objective 
realization. 

6. — With this view of the matter before us, and 
on such fundamental principles, we proceed to af- 
firm that God is a personal being. The doctrine 
that God is an impersonal being, probably owes its 
origin in part to a mistake in the philosophical ele- 
ments involved in the doctrine of personality, and 
in part to the fact, that God is without limits. As 



28 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

we have been in the habit of ascribing personality 
to beings who, in having form, are subject to the 
limitations of form, we easily fall into the habit of 
associating personality with such limitations, and at 
last are apt to adopt the conclusion, that where 
there are no limits, no well-defined boundaries of 
existence constituting a form, there can be no per- 
sonality. Now it must be admitted, that in the ex- 
tent or expansion of his being, God is without lim-. 
its ; but it does not at all follow that God, because 
he transcends the limitations of the human senses, 
and is not the subject of material measurement or 
any other measurement, is therefore not a personal 
God. The question of personality does not turn 
upon mere extent or expansion of being, whether 
physically or even psychically considered, but rath- 
er upon the traits or characteristics of being. In 
considering the subject of God's personality, it is a 
proper inquiry, whether he possesses intelligence 
which is cognizant of the fact of his own existence 
and power; whether he. has the capability of know- 
ing and affirming the fixed relation of himself, both 
in perception and action, to that interior law of rec- 
titude which is also a part of his being ; whether he 
possesses a volitional power correspondent to the 
powers of perception and the claims of moral obli- 
gation ? It is in the answer to such questions as 



THE PERSONALITY OF GOD. 



2 9 



these, that we find the basis of personality consider- 
ed as a fact or realization. And if the answer is in 
the affirmative, then God most evidently possesses 
all the requisites of personality, and stands forth be- 
fore the universe, not merely as a blind and unintel- 
ligent principle of movement, but as a personal God, 
capable of intelligent design and action, endowed 
with responsibility both to himself and to all beings 
that are dependent on him, and entitled, in the case 
of those who are dependent, to obedience and horn- 
age. 

7. — And it is proper to say here, as an indirect 
confirmation of our position, that humanity de- 
mands a God who can thus be recognized and wor- 
shipped. The instinct of reverence and homage, 
which evidently pervades the human heart, so much 
so that it has found its place as an attribute of hu- 
manity in all lands and all ages, requires, and cannot 
be satisfied with anything short of a personal God. 
In the view of the great masses of men, to deny the 
personality of God, is, to all practical purposes and 
results, much the same, as we have already intima- 
ted as to deny the existence of God. So that we 
run no hazard in saying, that a personal God is one 
of the great religious necessities of humanity. Re- 
ligion is the interior and domestic tie, which makes 
the united family of the finite and the Infinite. 



30 



ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 



And without a Being - , who is not only supreme in 
his attributes, but who is approachable, and can be 
addressed and confided in, on the basis furnished by 
a deific personality, the human race is necessarily 
left in the condition of a bewildered and sorrowing 
orphanage. 

8. — And we may add that the opposite doctrine 
that which denies God's personality, seems to us to 
be full of danger in other respects. It is not only 
the abnegation of religion, but of practical morality. 
The doctrine of impersonality, admitting that it some- 
times comes before us with learned and imposing 
pretensions, will be found, if allowed to go unques- 
tioned, to be attended not only with the rupture of 
God and man, but of man and his fellow-man. It is 
a doctrine which not only strikes boldly at the re- 
ligious intuitions of the great heart of humanity, but 
is an inlet, through its want of practical power, to 
hostility, fraud, cruelty, and all varieties of crime. 
~No theory of practical morals has ever been con- 
structed on the basis of the impersonality of God, 
which is available against the mighty evils that con- 
tinually imperil man's social condition. The auda- 
city of wrong and crime is not frightened by an ab- 
straction. Nor is it much afraid of a positive princi- 
ple of life, which has no self-regulated thought and 
volition. If it were possible for impersonality to 



THE PERSONALITY OF GOD. ?i 

leave us a God at all, which it is not, it would be a 
God with no eyes to see, and no ears to hear, and 
no hands to handle, and no head to think, and no 
heart to feel, and no will to execute ; — a God, if any 
one should object to the material form of the expres- 
sions, with nothing which our spiritual eyes could 
see, or our spiritual ears could hear, or our hearts' 
necessities could appeal to ; — a God, in any light in 
which it is possible to consider him, without a voice 
to cheer us in our efforts to do right, and without a 
hand to help us against the dangers which would 
certainly assail and overwhelm us. 



CHAPTER III. 

God as Life. 

I. — In subjecting the doctrines of Religion to the 
estimate of the Absolute, and in thus bringing them 
to the test of fundamental reason, so that the reli- 
gious announcement or doctrine, whatever it may be, 
shall be found identical with the eternal truth or 
otherwise, it will be necessary to say something of 
life as an ultimate and necessary principle, and to 
affirm and verify its identity with God. Everyone 
knows how common a thing it is to speak of God, 
not only as great and independent in himself, but as 
sustaining a causative relation, and as being the pri 
mal source and living principle or life of all things. 
But God could not be the source or life of other 
things without having life in himself. God is Life. 

And the question naturally arises in the inquiring 
mind what Life is? In answering this question, it is 
admitted that we may not be able, in consequence 
of its ultimate and primary position, to say what life 
is, in itself considered : but it will aid much in giving 



GOD AS LIFE. 



33 



clearness to our conceptions, if we proceed to give 
concisely but distinctly some of its marks or charac- 
teristics. 

I. — One of the marks or characteristics of Life, in 
its primary or ultimate sense, in distinction from 
anything of a subordinate or secondary nature which 
may sometimes bear that name, is, that it is without 
beginning. If the Life, meaning by the term what 
may be conveniently designated as the true or essen- 
tial Life, could not be said to exist without a begin- 
ning, then it would be true, that there was a time, 
(namely, the time antecedent to its beginning,) when 
it had no existence : a doctrine, which would leave 
the universe for unnumbered ages without any life- 
giving principle. It is hardly necessary to say that 
this is a view which is inadmissible. And besides, 
if there was a time when the Essential Life did not 
exist, and afterwards a time when it began to exist, 
then, inasmuch as not having existed at first it could 
not have created itself, it must have been brought 
into being by another Life antecedent to it in exist- 
ence. And if there was another principle of Life 
antecedent to it in existence, which was without be- 
ginning and had also by means of its higher and 
broader nature the power of developing existence in 
other forms, then that antecedent life was, and is, 
the Essential Life. Therefore it is reasonable to say 



34 



ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 



that one of the marks or characteristics of Life, in 
the true and higher sense of that term, is, that it is 
without beginning. 

2. — Another mark or characteristic of Life, in the 
higher or essential sense, is, that it is eternal. Eter- 
nity, which has reference to termination as well as 
commencement, and excludes both, is without begin- 
ning and also without end. The Essential Life is 
eternal. And it is so because it is without begin- 
ning. That which exists without beginning to exist, 
has the reason or ground of existence in itself; and, 
therefore, having life in itself and 0/" itself, there is no 
reason why it should die. The fact of existence, 
with no reason of existence but what is found in 
itself, obviously involves the idea of eternity of exist- 
ence. Being what it is, and with adequate reasons 
for thus being, and without any dependence for its 
existence on any thing outside of itself, it necessarily 
continues to be what it is. Continuance is the oppo- 
site of cessation. The Essential Life, therefore is 
eternal. 

3. — Another and third characteristic of the great 
living principle which we are considering, is that 
it is universal. If the principle of Life is limited, 
then, place the limitation wherever you may, the 
great universe of things, in comparison with which 
the restricted or limited universe is as nothing, is 



GOD AS LIFE. 35 

beyond this limit ; reaching out in all directions in 
immensity which is boundless ; and this infinitely 
wider or true universe is a universe without life, 
which is inconceivable. The fixed and necessary 
conceptions of the human intellect require life, 
wherever there is a capacity of life. A universe 
without life is nothing more or less than universal 
death. The doctrine of a universe without life is 
just as contradictory to the conceptions of the intui- 
tive or suggestional intellect of man, (that depart- 
ment of our nature which gives us all our primary 
or elementary ideas,) as would be the doctrine of a 
universe without the attendant conceptions and facts 
of space and time. It is on such grounds, stated as 
briefly as possible, that we are justified in the asser- 
tion, that the Essential Life is universal. 

4. — A fourth mark or characteristic is, that it is 
a life which in its own interior nature is without 
change. Changes spring out of it, since it is that 
essential unity of existence out of which comes all 
variety. But in itself it is unchangeable. And it is 
so, because it is eternal and universal.' Being eter- 
nal, it cannot limit itself in time ; and being univer- 
sal, it cannot limit itself in place. And being thus 
commensurate with all place and time, meeting the 
wants of every moment of time and of every condi- 
tion of things, a change in its own nature, whatever 



36 ABSOLUTE RELIGION 

may be true of change in its varied manifestations, 
becomes an impossibility. It is life now ; and it is 
life always. And it is the same life, the same in 
its nature and extent, to-day, yesterday, and for- 
ever. 

5. — Another characteristic of the Essential Life 
is, that it never ceases in its action. Activity is a 
part of its nature ; it is a principle, which ever goes 
out of its subject to its object, and finds the neces- 
sary nourishment of its own life in the good it does 
to another. To cease to act, therefore, would be to 
cease to live. It is true, that it changes its modes 
of action ; and this change of mode in action may 
be regarded as furnishing the compensation of rest ; 
but still, there is properly speaking, no cessation of 
activity. And accordingly, in being a perpetual 
life, it is also a perpetual development. Always 
one, and yet exhaustless and countless in its diver- 
sity ; the endless out-going of the central infinite in 
the multiplied and constantly varied manifestations 
of the finite. 

6. — It is, then, a life which is endless, boundless, 
changeless, ceaseless ; the source of all other life, 
because it is itself the true life ; and the source also 
in an important sense of all knowledge, because 
knowledge is inseparable from Life in its highest 



GOD AS LIFE. 



37 



form ; and yet, Life in its own nature, in many re- 
spects, is necessarily and forever unknown. 

And now comes a remarkable fact. Such char- 
acteristics as have now been described, will apply 
equally well to God, and to God only. The charac- 
teristics of Life are equally the characteristics of 
God. And they justify us in saying, that God has 
the true life in himself; that God is not only the 
great causative and living principle of all things, 
but more concisely and yet truly, that God is Life. 



CHAPTER IV. 

Identity of Life and Love. 

I. — But there is something additional, notwith- 
standing the possible limitations of our knowledge 
in some important respects, which may help us to a 
more interior view of the nature of Life. There is 
something within the limits of human experience, 
which allies us to the great Source from which we 
come, and which may be appealed to in these in- 
quiries. The Essential Life, in recognizing itself in 
its causative and sustaining form as existing in hu- 
manity, and in being thus brought in some degree 
within the sphere of human comprehension, and 
made the subject of human analysis, reveals itself 
as Love. So that in view of the evidences that at- 
tend it, we may venture to lay down the proposi- 
tion, that Love and Life are essentially the same: 
a proposition so wide in its sweep and so fruitful in 
its consequences that, while its evidences compel 
the acquiescence and homage of the intellect, its 



IDENTITY OF LIFE AND LOVE. 39 

tendencies and results, when rightly understood, fill 
the heart with joy. 

2. — In prosecuting the inquiries of this chapter, 
we derive an argument in support of the identity 
of Life and Love, in the first place, from the Divine 
Nature itself. And such an argument, harmonizing 
with the Absolute methods of thought, brings our 
conclusions, so far as they have a religious aspect at 
all, within the limits of the Absolute Religion. God 
is Life : God is Love. 

In being inseparable from all existences, in be- 
ing the central causative principle of afl existences, 
and in harmonizing with all existences, there is no 
possible motive or reason why the Divine Life 
should not be interested, (the relative position and 
responsibilities of all being taken into account,) in 
seeking the good, the happiness, and the perfection 
of all. Its motive of action cannot turn back upon 
itself and seek a causation prior to that which is al- 
ready first, because, being infinite itself, it cannot 
ascend a higher height, or sound a deeper depth, 
than it has in its own nature. And thus standing 
central, and at the same time without limitation, 
and consequently having no power outside of itself 
to excite its fears, or to limit its responsibilities, 
what strength of thought or ingenuity of conception 
can suggest a motive in the Infinite Mind, which is 



40 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

adverse to the universal good. In other words, the 
Life of God, in its substance and essentiality, is, and 
must be, a Life of Love. 

3. — And now let us look at the subject in another 
aspect. Love, in distinction from the counterfeits 
of love ; we mean that divine love, which u casts out 
fear,'' and which pursues the good of its object for 
the sake of the good and not for the sake of reward ; 
such love has all the marks or characteristics which 
have already been ascribed to the Essential Life. 
It was said of Essential Life that it has no beginning. 
The same can be said of Love. Looking at love 
psychologically, and in one of its most distinguishing 
aspects, it may be described as simply benevolent 
desire, or the desire of good. And like every other 
desire, it involves in its very nature and as a part of 
its nature, a tendency to activity and to practical 
results. It is essentially a motive power. Now 
take the universe as the theatre of inquiry, and say 
whether Love, considered as a motive power, has or 
can nave, admits or can admit, of any active and 
causative power antecedent to itself. Looking at the 
question psychologically, it seems to us that only 
three suppositions are possible in the case ; first^ 
indifference, which is not life, but the negation of 
life ; second, the desire of evil, which, if it be admit- 
ted as the primal activity, would annihilate God, and 



IDENTITY OF LIFE AND LOVE. 41 

enthrone Satan ; and third^ the desire of good, which 
is cnly another name for Love. 

Now apply this analysis to God. If God exists 
at all, he exists as Essential Life. As essential life, 
He is essential activity; and that, too, without a be- 
ginning of such activity. Forever, and as a part of 
his nature, He must have had in himself a motivity 
a principle of action. That principle of activity, 
could not have been indifference ; for that would be 
a contradiction in terms. It could not be the desire 
of evil, for that would constitute a satanic Infinite. 
On the only remaining supposition, it must have 
been the desire of good or love. Love therefore, is, 
and, from the nature of the case, must be, the con- 
stitutive activity of the universe, i^nd being central 
in the infinite nature, we may say of it as we say of 
God, it is without beginning ; and, therefore it is, 
and must be to that extent, the same with the Es- 
sential Life of things. 

4. — i\.nd again, looking at the subject a little fur- 
ther, we need not hesitate to say, that the circum- 
stances and intuitions which necessitate the affirma- 
tion, that Love is without beginning, involve also 
the additional affirmation, that Love is without end- 
ing, in other words, it is eternal. And as it has no 
beginning, and no ending, and thus covers all time ; 
so, looking at it in another aspect, and by means of 



4 2 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

other processes of thought, such as will easily sug- 
gest themselves, we are under the necessity of affirm- 
ing further that the principle under consideration is 
a principle without limitation ; a principle surmount- 
ing the boundaries which might be supposed to stop 
its progress, and reaching to every place and every 
object within the realms of actual or possible exist- 
ence. And this great principle, without beginning 
and without end, reaching to all objects and living 
in all events, universal by the same necessities which 
compel the fact of its eternity, is thus made to stand 
forth with the same attributes and the same features 
as the Essential Life. So that we are justified in 
saying that Life is Love, and Love is Life. And 
God, who is the embodiment of life, is the embodi- 
ment of love ; and is what He is, whether He is 
called God or Life, because He is Love. 

5. — These views are the views of the Absolute 
Religion ; views which involve the unchangeable 
facts and relations of things, and have the sanction 
of the highest reason ; and if God had not taught 
them in the Scriptures, we should still be held ac- 
countable by the light that is within. But the reli- 
gion of enlightened reason and the religion of the 
Bible are one ; thorough and candid inquiries, enlight- 
ened by the spirit of humility and faith, will not fail 
to harmonize them. And hence we open the Bible, 



IDENTITY OF II FE AND 10 VE. 



43 



and find that wonderful expression, repeated and 
emphasized in its essential meaning in a variety of 
forms, " God is LOVE.'' This great truth, upon 
which hinges the destiny of the universe, seems to 
have developed itself especially in the bosom of the 
apostle John. Without going through long pro- 
cesses of reasoning and possibly without any train- 
ing in such processes, he nevertheless had the grand 
intuitions of the heart, and uttered affirmations, 
which God in the soul had taught him. Plato, the 
first of Grecian philosophers, could affirm that God 
" geometrizes,'' and he uttered a truth, correspond- 
ing in depth and comprehension to this wonderful 
saying of the humble and loving disciple. 

6. — The doctrine that Love is identical with Life, 
brings the subject of the Essential Life within the 
sphere of human cognitions. It is true that Love, 
considered as Life, operates in all space and all time ; 
but it is also true that it does this, without being 
identical with either. So that it can be said, in ex- 
pressions which imperfectly convey the idea, that it 
is the life of space without being space, the life of 
time without being time ; in other words, a principle 
and not an expansion, an elemental activity, and 
not an outward, material measurement. And hence 
arises both the fact and the possibility of its incar- 
nation. The -Essential Life, whether called Life or 



44 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

Love, is individual as well as universal ; dwelling in 
God, and dwelling more or less, in all the creatures 
of God who are born into his image. And since the 
day when Christ walked in the valley of Nazareth, 
and wept in the garden of Gethsemane, it can be said 
that the life of God dwells in the soul of man, and 
the problem of the Infinite, so far as its most essen- 
tial element is concerned, is brought within the field 
of human consciousness, and is made the subject of 
human affirmation. The holy man, whoever and 
wherever he may be, walks in life ; — the same divine 
and essential life which dwells in the bosom of the 
Infinite. The life of the follower of Christ is the 
same in its essence with the life of Christ. There is 
a philosophical and substantial foundation for that 
wonderful but most true assertion of the apostle Paul, 
"I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me.'' The 
essential life of Christ was LOVE ; — the cross of Cal- 
vary was only its necessary resultant, and its divine 
symbol. The cross is Love : and in that view of the 
interior and subjective nature of the cross, it stands 
as a bright and perpetual reality in the heart of every 
Christian. * 



CHAPTER V. 

God as Unity and Duality. 

I. — Having given in the preceding chapters some 
of the marks or characteristics of Life, and shown its 
identity with Love ; and having seen that God is 
Life in the highest sense of the term, or what may 
conveniently be named Essential Life ; in other 
words, that the fact of his existence is a problem of 
necessity, that Life is in Him by essence or being, 
that He cannot be otherwise than what He is, and 
is without beginning and without end ; and having 
seen also that God, notwithstanding the objections 
that have been so freely made in these later times, 
is a Personality, and is susceptible of being recog- 
nized and approached as such; we are now prepared 
to go a step further, and to say in the light both of 
the Absolute Religion and the Scriptures, that God, 
the great fact and mystery of the universe, is at the 
same moment and by the necessities of existence, 
Unity, Duality, and Trinity. 

2. — It may be said, however, that neither of 



46 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

these great expressions standing alone, pregnant as 
they are with a deep and divine meaning, can con- 
vey to us the full idea of that wonderful being whom 
we call God. But taken in connection with each 
other and with Personality as the basis of their ap- 
plication, they open views of the Infinite, which the 
exploration of ages would not fully satisfy. We 
shall treat of them in the order in which they have 
been named. 

Of the first affirmation, namely, the Unity of the 
divine Nature, we shall have but little comparatively 
to say, because it is a subject on which much has 
been ably written, and is one which to thinking and 
philosophic minds is but little short of self-evident. 
The argument on the subject is commonly and very 
justly drawn from the evidences of oneness of design 
in the multiplied objects of creation. 

3. — There is a foundation for the argument from 
creation, because creation implies the fact of a crea- 
tor, and because, looking at these objects in the 
light of their logical relation, creation does not con- 
tain anything which did not antecedently exist in 
the ideas of the creating Mind, so that creation, ex- 
isting in the universe of objects around us, may justly 
be regarded as the out-going, the reflex, or if it be 
preferred, the shadows of the Infinite. And accord- 
ingly what God is in the eternal principles of his 



GOD AS UNITY AND DUALITY. 



47 



nature, including his Unity, is written not merely in 
the messages of Prophets and Apostles, but in his 
out-goings, in the emanations of Himself which ex- 
ist in the things that are made, in the great robe of 
created forms and life which hangs as a garment 
around the brightness of his essential being. And 
there, as we read in accordance with the laws of our 
mental beings the multiplied facts of emanated or 
created existence, which are expressions of the one- 
ness of thought and plan that lie hidden in the 
Source or Centre from which they come, our convic- 
tions become harmonized and consolidated in a par- 
ticular direction ; and at last it is impossible for us 
to doubt the Unity of that great Creative Centre. 
We cannot dwell, nor do we feel it to be necessary, 
upon the specific processes of thought by which this 
is done. Nevertheless, Unity is the first word in 
the divine alphabet ; and Nature, speaking in her 
silent voices, and writing her record in the book of 
the Absolute Religion, harmonizes with the Scrip- 
tures in saying, God is ONE God. 

4. — But this is not the only or the final word in 
the great facts of God's existence. We proceed 
therefore to say, without however, confidently ex- 
pecting an equal unanimity of opinion in regard to 
it, that the Divine Nature is dual, or two-fold, at the 
same time that it is one. This great mystery in the 



48 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

nature of the Divine Being is rendered possible by 
the great fact of Personality, which has this pecu- 
liarity, that, while it necessarily implies and in- 
cludes existence, it may be regarded as something 
more than existence, because it is a fixed and dis- 
criminated modification of existence. The unity is 
in the existence ; the duality which attaches to the 
same existence, and can never yield its claim to it, 
reveals itself in that real and indestructible modifi- 
cation of existence — that elemental fact of the uni- 
verse, not easily explained, but which can never be 
ignored, — called Personality. It is upon this basis 
that the Absolute Religion, which cannot interpret 
itself independently of existing facts, harmonizes 
with the Scriptures in breaking up the desolateness 
of Unity and proclaiming the two-foldness or duality 
of the Divine Nature. And if we will but open our 
eyes, so significant are the facts that have relation 
to it, we cannot fail to see at least some evidences 
of it. 

5. — Some of the facts upon which our conclusions 
are founded are these : In every form or kind of 
existence which comes fully within the limits of 
human knowledge, we find that each form, while it 
is discriminated from every other form, reveals within 
the prescribed limits of its own existence the won- 
derful combination of unity of nature with a two- 



GOD AS UNITY AND DUALITY. 



49 



foldness or duality in the constitution of that nature. 
Take our common humanity as an example. No 
-one can well deny that humanity is one in nature or 
being, while at the same time, without abrogating in 
any degree its unity and identity of nature, it is 
dualistic in personality. Man is not woman and 
woman is not man, and yet neither man nor woman 
is out of the limits of humanity. They stand re 
vealed, to the comprehension of all true and candid 
judgment, forever one in the essential identicalness 
of being or nature, and yet forever discriminated by 
facts and relations which make them two in one. 
And our argument is, that God, in revealing this 
great fact in everything that is made, has revealed, 
in connection with the primal and essential unity in 
his own existence, the additional fact of duality. In 
other words, God is both Fatherhood and Mother- 
hood. 

To the mind impelled by the laws of its own 
being, that intuitionally accepts the great fact of 
Causation, and can read the inherent nature of the 
cause in the facts that flow from it, this, I think, is 
the inevitable conclusion. And from the eternal 
Fatherhood and Motherhood, furnishing, in their co- 
existent and co-operative duality, the only conceiva- 
ble basis of such a result, all things proceed. 

6. — But is there anything in the Scriptures, any- 



5<D ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

thing in the common and generally accepted forms 
of religious thought and feeling which harmonizes 
with this view ? It may, perhaps, be admitted that 
the Scriptures are not very full or very explicit on 
this subject, and yet there are some things that favor 
what has been said. It is worthy of notice, that in 
the very earliest part of the Bible there are expres- 
sions which clearly intimate a plurality, not, indeed, 
in the essential nature, but in the personalities of the 
Godhead. The Hebrew word Elohim, which often 
occurs as the name of the Supreme Being, and which 
is translated God, is in the plural form. In the ac- 
count which is given in the first, third, and eleventh 
chapters of Genesis of God's early doings, he is 
represented as conversing with another, and in such 
a way as to convey the idea of more than one divine 
personality. It is a part of this early history that 
God made man in his own image ; and yet it seems 
to be obvious from what follows that the man who 
was thus created contained in himself a combination 
of male and female elements, which either consti- 
tuted, or was destined subsequently to constitute, a 
duality of persons. And it may be remarked in this 
connection that the intermingling of the plural pro- 
nouns us and our with the singular pronouns he and 
his, when God himself is the subject of discourse, as 
in Genesis i. : 26, 27, may be regarded as natural or 



GOD IS UNITY AND DUALITY. 



51 



at least explainable, on the supposition of a plurality 
of persons, but not otherwise. 

7. — In the book of Proverbs, the authorship of 
which is generally, and probably with justice, ascri- 
bed to Solomon, the second Personality, as it is 
sometimes called by writers, or that personality 
which indicates the maternal element and power of 
the Godhead, is understood by many commentators, 
especially those of a deeply intuitive and devout cast 
of mind, to be announced under the name of Wis- 
dom, called in the Greek Septuagint translation, SO- 
PHIA. "Wisdom," or the " Divine Sophia,'' is rep- 
resented in the eighth chapter of the book, as lifting 
up her voice, as standing in the top of high places, 
as crying aloud at the entrance of the city gates. 
The character of the language is so remarkable in 
some parts of the chapter, that it is certainly difficult 
to explain it on the ground merely of figurative 
forms of expression. " By me," says Wisdom, 
" kings reign and princes decree justice. By me 
princes rule, and nobles, even all the judges of the 
earth." And again, in language which reminds one 
of what is said of the Wisdom or Logos in John's 
gospel, " The Lord possessed me in the beginning 
of his ways, before the works of old." And again, 
There I was by him as one brought up with him ; 



ti 



52 



ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 



and I was daily his delight, rejoicing always before 
him." Prov. 8: 15, 16, 23, 30. 

I am aware that different and somewhat con- 
flicting interpretations have been given by learned 
men to this portion of Proverbs. The reader who 
wishes to go into a minute examination of it, which 
our limits and the pressure of numerous topics will 
not permit us to do, will find valuable aids in the 
15th volume of the Bibliotheca Sacra, in a very able 
and exhaustive article, in support of the position 
that Wisdom in these passages is a divine Personal- 
ity, by Professor Barrows, of Andover. 

We find evidence also, that the doctrine of a du- 
ality in the Godhead, and of a Wisdom or Maternal 
principle, existed widely among the Jews, from vari- 
ous passages in that portion of the Jewish writings 
which are regarded by the Protestants as apocryphal. 
In the apocryphal book, entitled the Wisdom of 
Solomon, written about one hundred years before 
Christ, and in the Greek language, the SOPHIA or 
Wisdom is repeatedly introduced, and in such a way 
as to indicate personality. In the 9th chapter, 4th 
verse, it is said, " Give me the SOPHIA [or Wisdom] 
which sitteth by thy throne" At the ninth verse, she 
is represented as being present with God when he 
made the world. And I think it is worthy of notice, 
that in the 1st and 2d verses of the 9th chapter, So- 



GOD IS UNITY AND DUALITY. 53 

phia or Wisdom is used as a parallel expression, and 
as synonymous with Logos. It is the same in the 
1 2th verse of the 16th chapter. Similar passages, 
and which have been understood, to some extent, as 
indicating a Motherhood or maternal personality in 
the Divine Nature, are found also in the apocry- 
phal book, entitled, the Wisdom of the Son of Si- 
rach. 

9. — In the Jewish CABALA, or traditional script- 
ural commentary, which began to be collected some 
years before the coming of Christ, there are eviden- 
ces of such a belief. Mrs. Child, in a work entitled 
u The Progress of Religious Ideas,*' has made refer- 
ence to this fact in a passage near the commence- 
ment of her second volume. " According to the 
cabalistic doctrine," she says, " God was pure, un- 
created light, existing by the necessity of its own 
nature, filling the immensity of space, and contain- 
ing within itself the principle of life and motion. 
The souls of all beings were portions of Him, and 
had existed in Him. All forms of being were mere- 
ly manifestations of his eternal, indwelling ideas. 
The Wisdom of the Eternal they supposed to be a 
feminine deity, whom they called SOPHIA." 

10. — The most satisfactory announcement, how- 
ever, on this deeply interesting subject, is that which 
occurs in the generally recognized Scriptures ; and 



54 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

is to be found in the first chapter of John's Gospel. 
To understand its full force, we must keep in mind, 
what I think a careful and critical examination will 
fully justify, the identity of the Logos and the Sophia. 
il In the beginning was the Logos or Word ; and the 
Word was with God, and the Word was God." In 
other words ; God, the great positive principle of 
the universe, the divine Personality, which is char- 
acterized especially by the attributes of power and 
causation, existed in the beginning, and as the ante- 
cedent of all created things. But He had a com- 
panion ; He did not exist alone. The Word or Lo- 
gos, the Wisdom or SOPHIA, different expressions 
for the same principle of Eternal Life, was with Him.- 
And the Logos was God ; not only with God, but 
was God. 

ii. — An Infinite Love, existing as a positive per- 
sonality, implies and requires, as the complement to 
its own nature, a correspondent existence, receptive of 
whatever it is able to communicate ; in other words, 
an Infinite Beloved. On no other supposition can 
we understand how the wants of its affectional na- 
ture, for we cannot suppose that God is destitute of 
such a nature, can be met. The personality of the 
infinite Love, which is characterized by the attributes 
of causation and power, would fail in the great pur- 
poses of being, and thus would essentially destroy 



GOD IS UNITY AND DUALITY. 55 

itself, if — speaking after the imperfect manner of 
men — it were not enfolded in the arms of the Eter- 
nal Wisdom, the Logos, the Sophia. Such, in the 
somewhat mystic words of the Apostle John, words 
liable, perhaps, to be misunderstood or perverted, 
but nevertheless significant of a truth of heavenly- 
beauty, is the announcement of the infinite Pater- 
nity and the Infinite Motherhood. 

Undoubtedly the language of John, like every- 
thing else that takes the imperfect form of words, is 
susceptible of criticism. We are aware there are 
those who are of opinion that the expressions he 
employs can be explained on the ground that the 
Logos is the name of an attribute merely, and not 
of a personality. But it must be admitted, I think, 
especially when all the facts brought to notice in the 
various passages are carefully compared, that such 
an explanation is not the most natural and obvious 
one. 

12. — The thought, which finds its expression in 
the fact of celestial maternity, makes its appearance 
in other quarters. The word Logos, as applicable 
to God, and used in a way to indicate, in the opinion 
of many, a divine personality, is found in the writ- 
ings of Philo of Alexandria, a learned Jew, who 
wrote a number of works in Greek previous to the 
time of John. According to a statement to be 



56 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

found in the Critical Greek Testament of Dr. Alford, 
Philo identifies the Logos with the Sophia, using the 
terms as convertible ; a circumstance of a good deal 
of interest in connection with the history of the use 
of these terms. It is worthy of remark, also, that 
the Logos, as the Eternal Reason, and spoken of in 
such a way as to imply, if not directly affirm, person- 
ality, has a place in the writings of Plato. It is not 
necessary to suppose, however, that John, who 
leaned on Jesus' bosom, and learned sympathetic- 
ally, as well as in other forms of instruction, the 
great truths that had their lodgement there, derived 
his views, as some have conjectured, from either 
Plato or Philo. He had other and higher sources of 
knowledge. Nor is it necessary to suppose with Dr. 
Adam Clarke on the other hand, although there are 
some facts which look in that direction, that Plato 
derived his knowledge on this subject, to whatever 
extent it may have existed, either directly or in- 
directly from the Jews. There is reason to believe 
that many of the leading philosophers of Greece, 
including Socrates, Plato, Pythagoras and Zeno in 
the number, were "true and earnest seekers after 
moral and religious truth. And it is true of all 
men in all ages of the world — not an accident but 
an eternal principle — that they who seek in sim- 
plicity and sincerity of spirit shall not fail to find, 



GOD IS UNITY AND DUALITY. 



57 



Scholars well understand, and perhaps more fully 
so at the present time than at any antecedent 
period, that there are many thoughts and sugges- 
tions in the doctrines and writings of Socrates and 
Plato, in particular, which harmonize well with the 
doctrines of the Scriptures. The same infinite Mind, 
which has never ignored its children in any coun- 
try or in any age, may have been the source of 
knowledge in both cases. 

13. — The doctrine under consideration makes its 
appearance from time to time subsequently to the 
time of Christ and his immediate successors. It is 
found for instance, in the writings of the learned 
Valentinus, who lived in the second century, a Jew 
by birth, but educated in Alexandria, and subse- 
quently resident in Rome. He regarded the Su- 
preme Being, in the first or earliest aspect in which 
he presents himself, as a great Primal Essence, a 
sort of unfathomable Abyss of Existence, an im- 
measurable ocean of life. His vast primal Existence 
either gradually develops itself, or manifests itself 
connaturally and from the beginning, as Aeons or 
Powers, which, as they were far removed according 
to Neander, " from abstract notional attributes," 
were probably regarded by Valentinus in the light 
of Personalities. And these appear to be repre- 
sented as complements or correspondences to each 

3* 



5 8 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

other, namely, as Positive or Causative on the one 
hand, and as Receptive on the other. He speaks 
of the Aeon Sophia, or the Eternal Wisdom, as 
unfolding itself, though at first weakly and imper- 
fectly, as the designing or contriving mind of the 
universe ; in other words the fashioning or artistic 
power. It at last incarnates itself in Christ, who 
in his human nature is the highest finite out-birth ; 
the beginning or Elder Brother of a great family, 
who may be expected to inherit the truth and 
purity which, in his human nature, were manifested 
in him. The doctrine of Valentinus is undoubtedly 
in many respects complex and obscure ; and these 
few sentences which give the most'favorable aspect, 
necessarily impart a very imperfect idea of it. But 
all that it is important here to know is, that it 
recognizes in the Divine Nature the fact of innate 
or connatural powers and personalities, which may 
be regarded as distinct and self-conscious in their 
manifestations, though having a common basis of 
existence, and also as being correspondent and com- 
plementary as Positive and Receptive, as Father- 
hood and Motherhood.* 

14. — Other writers, among whom Heracleon and 
Barsanides may be particularly named, who lived 

* See Neander's History of the Christian Religion and Church. 
Vol. I. Ait on Valentine and his School. 



GOD IS UNITY AND DUALITY. 59 

subsequently to Valentinus, may be regarded as 
sympathizing with him, and as being essentially of the 
same school of religious thought. Not unfrequently 
they apply the term Sophia, or Wisdom (the term 
adopted by all these writers from the Greek version 
of the striking passage in the book of Proverbs, 
which has already been named), in such a way, and 
in such connected epithets, as not only to indicate 
the fact of personality, but that divine and eternal 
relation of Fatherhood and Motherhood to which 
our attention in this chapter is particularly directed. 
The doctrine is found in Clement of Alexandria, 
who also lived subsequently to Valentinus, and 
whose views of religious truth were in other respects 
somewhat different. 

15. — In coming down to later times we find inti- 
mations of the doctrine under consideration in the 
writings possessing far more depth and value than 
is commonly supposed, of the Mystics and Quietists. 
Suso, one of the truly devout and learned German 
Mystics' of the fourteenth century wrote a work 
which he entitled " The Book of Eternal Wisdom." 
Suso recognized the common doctrine on the subject, 
that this living and personal principle, the divine 
Sophia of the Greek mode of expression and the 
u La Sagesse Eternelle'' as he calls it in the French, 
the eternal LOGOS or Wisdom, that dwelt with God 



60 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

and was God, bowed itself to the sphere of our err- 
ing humanity, and became incarnated in Jesus of 
Nazareth. And he expressly teaches, near the close 
of the first chapter, that we have a knowledge in its 
higher or pre-existent state by means of the knowl- 
edge which we have of Christ in his lower or incar- 
nate nature. WISDOM speaks, " If thou wouldst 
contemplate me," she says " in my ineffable Divinity, 
thou must gain a knowledge of me in my suffering 
humanity," a declaration which contains volumes of 
true knowledge. It is difficult to read the work to 
which we have referred, without recognizing in it 
the deep conviction on the part of the writer, of a 
Personality in the Divine Nature, of the same essen- 
tiality of being, with God and of God, and yet enti- 
tled to be characterized by that attribute of Mother- 
hood, without which the infinite Fatherhood, dear 
as it is, becomes a misnomer and a nullity Suso 
lived in the fifteenth century. At an earlier period 
in the twelfth century, Richard of the Abbey of 
St. Victor in Paris used expressions which involve 
the same doctrine. 

1 6. At a later period Jacob Boehmen, a Mystic, 
though in some respects differing from the school of 
Suso and Tauler recognized the doctrine of the Di- 
vine Motherhood. We can make nothing else of his 
frequent mention of the " Virgin Sophia," whom he 



GOD IS UNITY AND DUALITY. 6 1 

describes in various passages as the " Divine Wis- 
dom/' as " Eternal," and as a u Living Essentiality." 
If we understand him rightly, it was the Sophia, the 
Wisdom or Maternal Essentia or Personality of the 
Godhead, which incarnated itself in Christ, and which 
caused him, in a mother's Spirit though in a male 
form, to endure his great sufferings in behalf of a 
world which was to be born into a saved and regen- 
erated life of him and through him. Not unfre- 
quently the language of Christ, when it is allowed to 
enter and to leave its true impress on the interiors 
of the soul, has the sound and import of a mother's 
language : " Oh, Jerusalem, Jerusalem," he exclaims 
with true maternal feeling, " how often would I have 
gathered thy children together, even as a hen gath- 
ereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would 
not!" — Matt. 23: 37. The language which he 
utters on the cross is the very language of a loving 
mother, who is willing to suffer and even die for her 
erring children, if she can thereby bring them back 
to their father's house and to truth. " Father, for- 
give them, for they know not what they do." 

17. A few centuries ago, a sect came into exist- 
ence in Holland and England, who took the name 
of Familists, or Family of Love. Some years later, 
there appeared in England a sect whose views were 
similar in some leading respects to those of the Fam- 



62 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

ilists, who took the name of Philadelphians. In some 
of the writings which originated in these religious 
movements, we find evidence of the same tendency 
to recognize the Maternal Principle as a true and 
distinct Personality in the Godhead. One of these 
works is entitled u The Great Crisis/' published 
anonymously, but generally ascribed to a pious and 
learned man by the name of Roach. References to 
the subject which we have been considering, will be 
found in " The Great Crisis,'' on pages 93, 94, and 
95. Roach> as is common with all these writers, 
speaks of the Motherhood of the Infinite, under the 
name of the " Virgin Sophia.'' His language, in the 
pages referred to and in other places, is somewhat 
obscure, as if he hesitated to give a clear announce- 
ment to views which would be likely to meet with 
much opposition ; but on a careful examination of 
them, there seems to be no doubt as to his meaning. 
On page 93 we find the following passage: "That 
the doctrine of the SOPHIA, or Wisdom of God, as 
represented in the Virgin nature or Female property, 
is no new thing, will appear from what Solomon has 
written so peculiarly of her, and from Christ's own 
expressions, Luke 7: 35." The passage in Luke is 
this : " But Wisdom is justified of all her children." 
Wisdom here, as Roach understands it and explains 
it in a brief remark, is the Eternal Mother. And 



GOD IS UNITY AND DUALITY. 63 

then, speaking of the doctrine farther, he immedi- 
ately adds, " Nor has it been without peculiar regard 
in the writings, also, of the ancient Fathers, though 
by them more generally applied to the Divine Wis- 
dom as derivative in the Son (a meaning which is 
good and true in its place). But the sense of the 
Primitive Church, as taking it in the superior sense 
also, [namely as applicable to the Sophia or Pre-ex- 
istent Christ] appears from that noted passage of 
Tertullian versus Hermogenenem, cap. iv.'' This 
passage, which Roach understands as sustaining his 
views, he quotes and comments upon. 

18. — As we approach nearer our own times, we 
find the same view taken. It differs, it will be no- 
ticed, from the generally received view chiefly in go- 
ing a step farther and indicating, though of course 
very imperfectly, the nature of the relations existing. 
The doctrine that the " second person of the Trinity 
as it is frequently denominated by writers, sustains 
a relation which may properly be expressed by the 
term Motherhood, is recognized in the views and 
writings of the sect of the United Society of Believ- 
ers commonly called Shakers. In the " Summary 
View," so called, which is published under the au- 
thority of the Society, and contains a brief exposition 
of their doctrines, it is said, p. 219, speaking of Ann 
Lee, that the image and likeness of the Eternal 



64 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

Mother was formed in her as the first-born daughter. 
And again it is said on the same page, that the u hu- 
man tabernacle of Ann Lee," meaning her earthly 
body, " was but flesh and blood like those of all 
other women; but it was a. chosen vessel, occupied 
as an instrument by the Spirit of Christ ; " that is to 
say, by the same pure and celestial Spirit which 
dwelt in Christ. " It is this Spirit,'' it is afterward 
said, " which is the image and likeness of the Eternal 
MotJierT At page 217 it is remarked in relation to 
Christ, it was u necessary that the human tabernacle 
of Jesus should be created by the immediate opera- 
tion of the Eternal Father and Mother." 

19. — The doctrine, that the Divine Nature is 
dual in its personalities, and that this duality implies 
and includes the fact of a divine maternity, is adopt- 
ed and advocated by the sect known as Bible Com- 
munists. The leading doctrines of this people are 
found in a work entitled the Berean ; a work which 
is characterized by acuteness of thought and reason- 
ing, and by no small share of biblical learning. 

" We believe," says the author of this work in 
his Preface, in the Duality of the Godhead ; and that 
Duality, in our view, is imaged in the twofold per- 
sonality of the first man, who was made male and 
female, Gen. 1 : 27. The doctrine is brought 
out more fully in the chapter on the Divine 



GOD IS UNITY AND DUALITY. 65 

Nature. On page 87 are the following expressions : 
" For our part, instead of having any repugnance 
against the idea that God is abi-personal Being [that 
is, one in essential nature, but distinct and correlative 
in dual personalities] we find all our natural prepos- 
sessions in its favor. We are quite willing that the 
indications of the created universe should be true ; 
that woman, as well as man, should have her arche- 
type in the primary sphere of existence ; that the 
Receptive as well as the Active principle, subordi- 
nation as well as power, should have its representa- 
tive in the Godhead. And we believe that an un- 
sophisticated child would much prefer the family 
idea of a dual head over all, a Father and Mother of 
the universe, to the conception of a solitary God.'' 

20. — We will only add further, that the Catholic 
Church is often regarded, with how much reason we 
will not undertake to say, as embodying the idea of 
the Motherhood element which exists in the Infi- 
nite, in its recognition of the holy or cleific nature 
of Mary, the mother of Jesus, and in the high hon- 
ors, and even worship, which it is understood to 
render to her. In the paintings of the great mas- 
ters, which often adorn the Catholic churches, and 
particularly the Cathedrals, the admiring and tearful 
eye of the worshipper often rests with the deepest 
reverence and hope upon that benign countenance, 



66 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

which becomes to the eye of faith the imperfect and 
yet beautiful symbol of the great and overshadow- 
ing Maternity, which exists innate and glorious in 
the Godhead. 

21. — Such appears to be the new and dawning 
thought of the world on this important subject; at 
first but dimly appearing in the Scriptures ; but in 
accordance with the promise of the great Teacher, 
who said, " when the Spirit of truth is come he will 
guide you into all truth/' revealed at last with clear- 
er and ever-increasing distinctness, by the Holy 
Spirit, or Spirit of God, or Spirit of universal truth 
and love, finding its way into and operating intelli- 
gently and effectively in the hearts of humble and 
sincere men ; and thus unfolding in these latter 
days the great and eternal facts which harmonize 
with and which sustain the progress of humanity. 

It is with interest therefore, in opening the vol- 
umes of a remarkable man, the late Theodore Par- 
ker, who accepted the doctrines of the Absolute Re- 
ligion while he demurred vigorously to some of the 
positions of dogmatic theology, that we find him 
not only announcing God as the primal, unific, and 
causative principle of things, but also defending the 
truth, hardly less essential and important, of the 
Personality of God, and announcing still further, 



GOD IS UNITY AND DUAIITY. fy 

with a boldness and clearness indicative of the 
strength of his convictions, the duality of the Di- 
vine Nature as being Motherhood as well as Fath- 
erhood. 



CHAPTER VI. 

• The Son of God. 

I. — The duality of the Divine Existence, involv- 
ing the fact of Fatherhood and Motherhood, neces- 
sitates that further unfoldment of being, which is 
implied in, and is not inappropriately expressed by, 
the word Trinity. Around this grand and historic 
word, which alternately attracts and repels by the 
greatness of the mystery involved in it, the world's 
thought and the world's controversy have for ages 
revolved. As it is not our object, however, to dis- 
cuss religious truths in the precisions of their estab- 
lished dogmatic forms, but rather as they present 
themselves in their necessary facts and relations to 
the enlighted view of the whole human mind, we 
leave the Trinity, as one of the generally accepted 
methods of expression, to complete and verify itself 
by its own logical processes, and in its own time 
and way. 

2. — But before proceeding further, I think it will 
be necessary briefly to say something of a personal 



THE SON OF GOD. 69 

nature, in order to a proper understanding of my 
own position, and as explanatory in part of my own 
tendencies of thought. I hope the reader will bear 
with me and sympathize, when I say that I am 
a believer in, and a lover of the biblical Scrip- 
tures. I frankly and joyfully acknowledge, that I 
have found in them not only an enlightening, but I 
trust something of a positive and renovating power. 
At the same time I am obliged to say further, that 
under the influence of inward suggestions, which I 
will not stop to explain and define, I have thought 
it right and felt it a duty, to compare the moral and 
religious revelations embodied in the Bible with the 
moral and religious thought of different ages and 
nations. I wished to ascertain in this way, and 
with the aid of the histories of philosophical opin- 
ions, the relation of the Scriptures to the moral 
wants and the enlightenment of universal humanity. 
And in the fulfilment of these desires, I have not 
only examined the Scriptures to some extent in the 
original languages, but have trodden the soil of Pal- 
estine, which may be regarded as a living commen- 
tary ; and have verified, or attempted to verify, so 
far as illustration and verification can now come 
from those sources, the Scriptural affirmations in 
the birth-place of their origin ; — in Nazareth and 
Bethlehem, on the banks of the Jordan, in the sacred 



;o 



ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 



places of Jerusalem, in the terrible deserts and on 
the rocky summits of Sinai. And not only this: I 
have read, as many others have done, the truth of 
the declarations of the Bible in the direct as well as 
the comparative history of nations, and in the rec- 
ords of my own heart. And therefore, without for- 
getting the intelligence and the conclusions of oth- 
ers, I frankly affirm that the Bible is no fable to 
me. I have no hesitancy in saying, that in my 
view, subject to the condition of a candid and wise 
interpretation, the Bible is the affirmation of the 
highest intelligence, and is the eternal u Word of 
God." 

3. — But there is another view, which it would be 
unwise and unphilosophical to omit. I remember 
also, that God is not only the God of the Bible, but 
the God of all nature, and of all history, and of all 
things. And so much so that He cannot be sepa- 
rated without the denial of the essential elements 
of his nature from any thing and every thing which 
exists ; but on the contrary is found to be and can- 
not possibly be otherwise than universal, unchange- 
able, and eternal in all that He is, in all that He 
does, and in all that He utters. And it is, there- 
fore, I believe, that the word of God in his Reveal- 
ed Religion, known as the Bible or Scriptures, and 
the word of God in the Absolute Religion, when in- 



THE SON OF GOD. yj 

terpreted in the true and divine light of things, are 
and must be the same. It is possible that men 
may fail to harmonize the two but the harmony ex- 
ists. 

4. — It is well known that theologians, looking 
perhaps with the theologic eye, have found a Trin- 
ity in the Bible. We do not say that they have 
always understood or expressed it rightly ; or that 
their views, often divergent from each other, are 
always entitled to assent. Nevertheless it is the 
general testimony of their writings and creeds that 
they have succeeded in finding it there ; at least in 
the essential nature of the thing. And such is my 
own belief. And it is not surprising to me that 
God, whose wisdom always adapts itself in its exer- 
cise to the existing state of things, communicated 
this great truth, in the early periods of the world, in 
the dogmatic form and simply as a doctrine and 
not as a philosophy. As thus stated, and standing 
by itself alone, it. is not free from obscurity; and 
there is a class of minds which do not readily accept 
it. But the God of the Bible is the God of univer- 
sal nature. And it is not strange that in these lat- 
ter days, with all the enlightenment of arts and let- 
ters and of moral and religious progress, so,me of the 
obscurities of the Bible are explained and reconciled 
by the light of the Absolute Religion. 



72 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

5. — To the thoughtful mind it is a natural sug- 
gestion, that the duality of the Divine Existence, 
written everywhere in the book of nature, necessi- 
tates a Trinity. The train of thought in the case is 
essentially this. It is not only true, as the apostle 
Paul teaches us, but it is a truth which harmonizes 
with the nature and position of man who reasons 
constantly from effects to causes, that we learn the 
things of God from the things that exist. In other 
words, the effect in the principles and methods of 
its being, is antecedently in the cause. And what 
do we find in the effect ? In the first place it pre- 
sents itself as a duality. But it does not stop there. 
We always find that the out-birth of that which in 
the order of nature goes before, supplementing and 
carrying out the fact of duality, in other words the 
added fact which constitutes the Trinity, every- 
where manifests itself in the objects of the world 
around us. Everywhere there is a duality of exist- 
ence, resulting in a reproduction which constitutes 
a trinity. But the things which exist, and which 
necessarily carry with them the evidence of the 
highest wisdom, are but the reflex or the mirror of 
the great First Cause from which they came. The 
cause holds the effect in its arms and stamps its 
image upon it. And thus the duality which in the 
objects of nature around us always implies and ne- 



THE SON OF GOD. 



73 



cessitates the fact of a Trinity, reveals in the light 
of the relation of effects and causes, the antecedent 
but correspondent fact, not only of the duality but 
also of the tri-unity of the Infinite. 

6. — If we are right therefore in the view which 
we take, we must supplement the eternal Fatherhood 
and Motherhood by the eternal Son. The eternal 
Son, or the Son " eternally proceeding," as it is some- 
times theologically expressed, is the great and un 
ceasing out-birth of the Divine Duality. That 
which being in God, is necessarily in its appropriate 
time born out of God, is the Son of God. But the 
Son of God is a wide and mighty form of expression 
wnich, in order to embrace the whole truth included 
in it, may be presented to our notice, first, generi- 
cally or in its most general form ; and second, specifi- 
cally or in relation to that remarkable manifestation 
of the divine in the human, (undoubtedly the most 
remarkable fact in human or any other history) 
which is known as both Son of God and Son of Man. 

7. — Generically, or considered in the whole of its 
extent, the trinal out-birth, otherwise called the Son 
of God, without which the eternal Fatherhood and 
Motherhood could have neither name nor power 
nor meaning, is the whole of creation from its lowest 
to its highest form. Spoken of in terms suggested 
by the analogy of the human form, which in some 
4 



74 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

respects may be regarded as the physical similitude 
and outward portraiture of God, the myriads of ex- 
istences which form the lowest stratas or divisions 
of beings, constitute the FEET ; the highest develop- 
ments and classifications of existence constitute the 
head ; and the intermediate grades, all in their ap- 
propriate places and fulfilling their appropriate offi- 
ces, make out and manifest the completeness and 
beauty of this boundless and unceasing out-birth or 
generation of positive and separate life. 

8. — So that not an insect that floats in the air, 
nor a fish that swims in the sea, nor a bird that 
sings in the forests, nor a wild beast that roams on 
the mountains ; not one is or by any possibility can 
be shut out and excluded from the meaning and 
the fact of the divine Sonship, considered in this 
generic or universal sense. Under that significant 
and glorious name in its generic and widest import 
are included all possible forms and degrees of being, 
whatever may be their distinctive character, which 
sustain the relation of effect or createdness to the 
great Causative Centre which lies hidden in what 
may be called the Dual Infinite. And this Sonship 
of universal existence, though it undoubtedly sus- 
tains the relation of effect to cause, is nevertheless 
so closely and indissolubly interwoven with the Eter- 
nal source from which it springs, that it may, in a 



THE SON OF GOD. 



75 



proximate but most important sense, be said of it, 
that it is without beginning and without end ; that 
no time in its specific measurement is allowed to 
mark its commencement and that no time, unless 
the same can be said of God himself, can announce 
the hour of its termination. It is what theologians, 
with a just and significant expression, have some- 
times called it, the eternal Sonship, or a Sonship in 
eternal procession. In other words, in the two-fold 
bosom of the Dual Infinite there exists a Sonship, 
which identical in nature but discriminated in per- 
sonality, converts two-foldness into tri-foldness, du- 
ality into trinity, and of which it can be said in its 
objective manifestation it is always being born, and 
in the mystery of its subjective existence it is always 
in the bosom of its eternal birthplace and always 
in readiness to be born. 

9. — All living nature then in all the variety of 
its forms, being only the out-birth of that which has 
existed interiorly and subjectively from eternity, is 
the mighty procession of form, feeling and activity 
which, in virtue of its birth-place, constitutes the 
Son of God. And in this vast complexity of Son- 
ship, including all possible degrees and forms and 
methods of being, there is not a living thing that is 
forgotten, not one that is not overshadowed by the 



y6 ABSOLUTE RELIGION: 

divine Love. All sheep and oxen, and the cattle 
upon a thousand hills, and the young lions of the 
forest, and the fishes of the sea, and the birds of the 
air, as they could not be born and exist without God, 
have a right to be called the children of God. " Are 
not five sparrows sold for two farthings, and not one 
of them is forgotten before God," " thou shalt not 
muzzle the ox that treadeth out the corn,'' " thou 
givest them their meat in due season," — it is such 
expressions as these which show the loving heart 
of the Infinite. 

And little does that man know of the greatness 
and boundlessness of God's universal love whose 
heart is not touched with the deepest sympathy for 
everything that exists, no matter what it is or where 
it is. If we are one with God we are one in all we 
can do to contribute to the happiness of everything 
God has made. 

io. — But again and specifically the Sonship, which 
constitutes and completes the divine Unity, not 
only in Duality but in Trinity, so that we can speak 
of the oneness of Eternal Life in the three-foldness 
of Personality and relations, the One in Three and 
the Three in one, is found in Man. Not man how- 
ever, in the first form of life, not the self-centred and 
limited Adamic man, (a subject on which we shall 
have something explanatory to say in another 



THE SON OF GOD. 



77 



place ;) but man with the experience of the second 
or higher birth, which expands the self-centred into 
the universal-centred and God-like form of life ; man 
standing at the head and as the comprehension and 
the perfection of all lower existences ; man who 
cannot separate his own life and happiness from the 
life and happiness of all other beings, man in his 
glorious Christhood. This is Sonship in the specific 
and higher sense ; the fulfilment of the prayer and 
hope of the long expectant ages ; the culmination 
of humanity in the Son of the virgin Mother. 

ii. — I stand with awe in the presence of this great 
out-birth. The true man was born : the effulgent 
model and ante-type of the incoming, heavenly hu- 
manity ; and becoming the dwelling-place of God, he 
embodied the glory of divinity in the humbleness of 
the human form ; and in virtue of that which was 
within Him, took the name in the specific and more 
glorious sense of the term of the Son of God. I 
shall be pardoned for saying it is my earnest prayer, 
that I may understand more and more this great 
advent known specifically as the divine Son. I do 
not believe that a true philosophy has any sympa- 
thy with that perversity of spiritual perception 
which turns coldly away from this divine brightness. 
The expression which better than any other meets 
my thoughts, and which in the comprehension of its 



78 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

meaning reveals the evidence of its divine origin is, 
"God manifest in the flesh." Being not only made 
in the similitude of man, but being the possessor of 
a man's nature, we do not find him as he is histori- 
cally represented, exempt from human weaknesses 
and trials, temptations and sorrows. In what sense 
therefore, is it possible to speak of him as the mani- 
festation of God ? This is a great question. With 
a view to the better understanding of it, we leave 
the subject here until we shall have considered in 
the next chapter the necessity and possibility of a 
divine manifestation. 



CHAPTER VII. 

Necessity mid Possibility of a Divine Manifestation. 

I. — Religion, considered in its essential nature, 
and in the aspect of its great and final result, is and 
must be harmony with God. Reason as we may 
upon the subject, it will be found in the end, that 
it cannot be anything greater, nor anything less, nor 
anything different from this. But harmony, admit- 
ting there is a slight difference in the import of 
the terms, necessarily implies union ; and indeed 
might properly be defined as the completion or per- 
fection of union ; and in the case of intelligent and 
moral beings, it is hardly necessary to say that it is 
and must be conscious union. 

2. — And now we proceed to say further, that 
there cannot be a conscious union, especially one 
which rises to the eminent degree which entitles it 
to be called harmony, without a knowledge of God. 
In other words, in order to this result of harmony 
which is the substance of religion, God must make 
himself known, must manifest himself. To be con- 



80 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

sciously united with God and yet without a knowl- 
edge of God is a contradiction in terms, and is a 
moral impossibility. And further, if God is not to 
be manifested in such a way as to make himself 
known, what is the object of his existence ? Why 
should he exist at all ? The manifestation of God 
therefore, in some important respect, so that we can 
speak of him intelligently and give him both thought 
and affection, may be regarded as a NECESSITY. 

3. — So far as this, the Absolute philosophy ex- 
presses itself with confidence. And the human 
heart, that which in man feels rather than thinks, 
but which embodies truth in the instincts of feeling, 
confirms the decision. But here comes a difficulty. 
Granting that it is necessary in the decisions of the 
human intellect, granting that it is necessary to meet 
the conscious Avants of human feeling, is it a thing 
which is possible ? Is it possible for the Infinite to 
manifest itself understandingly to the finite? Or 
taking the converse proposition, is it possible for 
the finite, in the limitation of its powers, to compre- 
hend that which is without limits? In the view of 
sound reason it seems to be necessary to answer 
these questions in the negative. But it appears to 
have escaped very much the thoughts and knowledge 
of men, that infinity is not God but only the mode 
or manner of his existence, namely, the extent or 



DI VINE MA NIFE S TA TION. 8 1 

degree of his existence ; and that we may know God 
in the essentiality of his nature, in that which con- 
stitutes the primal and deific substance of his being, 
although it may be true, and is true, that we cannot 
know Him on account of the limitations of our pow- 
ers in the fullness of his extent or degree. In other 
words, if we cannot know God in his degree or meas- 
urement, we may still know him, which is of far 
greater importance, in his truth or essence. 

4. — But let us look a little further. If infinity is 
not God but only the degree or extent of his exist- 
ence, the question still remains, — what are we to 
understand by God, and what is it which constitutes 
the primality and essence of his being ? Do we or 
can we find Him in the true and higher sense in his 
attributes? Let us reflect a moment on this impor- 
tant question. Take the attribute of knowledge, 
even when it is considered in the degree or extent 
of infinitude, and is properly denominated Omnisci- 
ence, does it make or constitute God?. Sound rea- 
son will also be compelled to answer here in the 
negative. And again, God is a being of power. 
But does the attribute of power, even when joined 
in its extent with infinitude and denominated Om- 
nipotence, any more than the attribute of omnisci- 
ence make or constitute God ? And here also we 
are compelled to answer, that such cannot possibly 



82 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

be the case. The word attribute itself, which men 
agree in using as applicable to and as descriptive in 
part of omniscience and omnipotence, implies that 
in the order of nature there is and must be a prin- 
ciple back of these, a living and pre-eminent primal- 
ity which will call knowledge and power into action 
and give them and all other attributes their appro- 
priate direction and issues. And this principle 
which, as we have already seen in a former chapter, 
is the essential and eternal life of the divine exist- 
ence, and in fact constitutes that existence, is LOVE. 
And this interior principle which constitutes the es- 
sential nature of God and to which are appended 
the attributes that operate as the instruments of its 
decrees, involves in itself and as a part of its own 
nature, an ultimate motive power which is the basis 
of the activity of the universe. If it were otherwise, 
in other words if there were a destitution and ab- 
sence of such motive power, constituting a state of 
things which could properly be described by the 
word indifference, then of course all the existing 
wonderful activities would cease, and God would be 
practically annihilated. And again, if this interior 
principle of which we speak were not indifference 
but a practical or motive evil principle, then, instead 
of God we should have and it could not be other- 
wise, an infinite Satan. But the Absolute philoso- 



DI VINE MA NIFE S TA TION. 8 3 

phy affirms as well as the Bible and in confirmation 
of the Bible, not merely that God exists but that 
God is Love. And hence it will be found, and all 
exhaustive and ultimate researches will prove it to 
be so, that every exercise of his omniscience and 
omnipotence or other attributes is dictated by be- 
neficence. 

5. — The manifestation of himself therefore, which 
it was necessary for God to make, and which the 
wants of an erring and suffering humanity required, 
and which the Absolute Religion aiming as it does 
at the establishment of universal harmony impera- 
tively demands, was the manifestation of himself in 
his essential nature as Love. 

The manifestation of the auxiliary incidents or at- 
tributes of the Divine Nature, such as knowledge and 
power, and especially with the weight and expansion 
of infinitude attached to them, when standing alone 
and without a manifestation of that interior and es- 
sential life which holds them in its hand and guides 
them to beneficent issues, was calculated to frighten 
and destroy and not to save humanity. But in 
what way could that deeper and more interior man- 
ifestation of God as Love, which alone could bring 
adjustment and peace and hope to men be made ? 

The question which now presents itself was, in 
some important sense, the great problem of the 



84 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

ages. And in the first place all enlightened philoso- 
phy will agree that it was necessary that it should 
be made within the sphere of humanity. In other 
words, it was necessary that it should be made in 
such a way that man with the limited faculties which 
he possesses and with precisely such faculties in kind 
as he possesses, should be able to behold, study and 
comprehend it. 

6. — But something more is necessary than this 
general statement. Shall we find the manifestation 
of God in his true and essential nature, as some 
heathen nations have foolishly thought, in the lower 
forms of creation, in birds and reptiles, and even in 
inanimate things ? That such an idea should have 
existed is indeed an evidence of the wants and crav- 
ings of the human heart; and perhaps it would be 
unphilosophical to deny that there is an element of 
truth in it, inasmuch as there is something of God 
in all the creatures of God, however low they may 
be in the scale of being. But the darkened belief 
which accepts the manifestation of God in such in- 
ferior things, a belief to which the Apostle Paul so 
feelingly and pointedly alludes, cannot contribute to 
man's elevation ; but on the contrary, as appears 
from the records of heathen nations, tends greatly 
to hold him fast in hopelessness and debasement. 
Nor on the other hand, would a manifestation made 



DIVINE MANIFESTATION. 85 

in the form of beings above the sphere of humanity, 
through forms and faculties not commensurable with 
and susceptible of being interpreted by anything 
given to man, have been of any more avail. It 
might not have tended to debase, but it is not ob- 
vious that it could have tended to elevate, because, 
being above the reach of the human faculties, it 
could not be understood. 

There is left, therefore, only the method which 
infinite wisdom adopted, that of the incarnation of 
the divine in the human form ; the incarnation 
of the Son of God ; — " God. manifest in the flesh." 

7. — And this is a method of manifestation, which 
does not merely excite our admiration and gratitude ; 
but which, far more than any other that is possible 
to be suggested, satisfies our reason. If God is Love, 
the manifestation would necessarily be in that 
method which would best secure the results at 
which love aims. God, therefore, with a condescen- 
sion which of itself intimates his true nature, took 
upon himself humanity in order that he might be 
comprehended by humanity ; and that, if he could 
not be measured in his infinitude, nor be understood 
in the truth and essentiality of his nature through 
the incidents of knowledge and power alone, he 
might be understood by submitting to be nailed to 
the Cross in that which was and is the essential 



86 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

principle of his life ; a principle which gives direction 
to knowledge and power, and which stamps its value 
on infinitude. 

8. — But in the realization of this great event, al- 
though through the teachings of types and prophe- 
cies they had long looked for something of this kind, 
men seem to have been greatly perplexed in one 
particular. In consequence of the associations 
which they had been accustomed to attach to rank 
and station, they expected that the descending God, 
whose advent the earlier ages had predicted, would 
make his appearance with all the pomp and circum- 
stance at least which belong to the highest human 
station. They looked for a king in the human 
and historic sense of the term. But that was not 
God's plan. In his view human existence, aside 
from the incidents of rank and station, embodies the 
evidence of the highest wisdom and goodness. Man, 
who was made in the image of God, man in his sim- 
ple humanity, unadorned with the incidents which 
give a fictitious splendor, without a sceptre and with- 
out a crown, was the fitting instrumentality in which 
God was to make himself known. And therefore 
" God manifest in the flesh," was God manifest in 
man ; — man low in worldly station, with nothing 
calculated to arrest attention ; but poor, untitled, 
friendless, and unknown. He chose humanity and 



DIVINE MANIFESTA TION. 



87 



not rank ; the thing and not the incidents of the 
thing ; humanity, as it were, in its nakedness ; and 
thus forever gave a sanction and elevation to man as 
man. 



CHAPTER VIII. 

Christ as the Fulfilment of the -Law. 

I. — Keeping in mind that we are examining 
things, or at least attempting to do so, in their prin- 
ciples or philosophical bases, we proceed now to an- 
other subject. It is hardly necessary to say that 
the thought of the Christian world has always been 
directed with peculiar earnestness to the various 
events which constitute the life and death of Jesus 
Christ. His death, as well as the antecedent events 
of his personal history, has a significancy which will 
not be likely to be exhausted while there are souls 
to be saved. The life of Christ, including its clos- 
ing scenes, is often spoken of and regarded as a " ful- 
filment of the law." Christ himself foreseeing the 
probable termination of his life and its relation as a 
whole to all antecedent facts and events, refers to 
the subject, Matt. 5:17, 18 — "Think not that I am 
come to destroy the law or the prophets. I am not 
come to destroy but to fulfil. For verily I say 
unto you, till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one 



CHRIST AS FULFILMENT OF THE LA W. 



89 



tittle shall in no wise pass from the law till all be 
fulfilled." In a passage of the prophet Isaiah, ch. 
42: 21, which is generally understood to apply to 
Christ, it is said " he will magnify the law and make 
it honorable." It is often said that we are to look 
for the fulfilment of the law in the death of Christ 
on the Cross. And yet, when brought to the test 
of a philosophical examination, the death of Christ 
considered in itself and separate from that which is 
the basis or foundation of it, might justly be regard- 
ed as coming short of such fulfilment. The death 
of Christ in its physical aspects was much like any 
other death ; the experience of physical disorgani- 
zation and suffering, — probably very great suffering, 
■ — resulting in the separation of the body and the 
spirit. Nevertheless, it is in the death of Christ 
that we find the key to his character ; that which 
interprets the meaning of his antecedent acts ; that 
which consolidates and perfects his life ; that which 
makes him in a true sense, when we get at that 
which underlies his death, the world's Saviour. 

2. — In speaking of Christ, in the events and inci- 
dents of his life and death as the fulfilment of the 
law, it is necessary to understand what meaning and 
what limitations we shall attach to Law itself. And 
here we are met by the fact that there are a great 
multitude of laws in the universe. Go where we 



90 



ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 



will, we meet with this great regulative influence. 
There is nothing high enough or low enough, no 
boundaries of time or space, which are beyond the 
cognizance and the authority of Law. The philo- 
sophic interpreters of their own and the world's 
thought on this subject, Cicero, Grotius, Vattel, 
Hooker, Montesquieu, and others, agree in the 
great doctrine of the universality of Law. And what 
is also of great importance, there are different kinds 
of law ; laws which are mental and moral as well as 
physical ; laws which give stability to thought and 
guidance to virtue, as well as those more obvious 
laws which sustain and develop material beauty and 
strength. 

3. — The law which Jesus fulfilled, coming under 
the general class of mental or spiritual, is the law 
fundamental to all others ; the Primal law, because 
it stands first in time as well as first in importance ; 
the law, without which God would cease to be God ; 
that great law of which we have spoken in a former 
chapter, which binds the higher to the lower, the 
stronger to the weaker, and we may add, the good 
to the evil, in the exercise of all the possibilities of 
benevolence, which are involved in the fact of a 
higher position and a greater wealth of resources. 
In comparison with this law which is known in the 
Scriptures as the law of Love> all other laws sink 



CHRIST AS FULFILMENT OF THE LAW. m 

into insignificance. It is the basis Law of the uni- 
verse ; and Christ came not merely to announce it 
as a principle but to fulfil it as a fact, in order that 
men seeing with their own eyes that Love is ready 
to pour out its heart-blood for the good of others, 
might understand and know, as they otherwise 
could not do, the moral basis on which the universe 
stands. 

4. — The law of love when carried out to its ap- 
propriate issues, constitutes as we have already had 
occasion to show, the central life-principle of God 
himself. Love is life and wherever it exists, wheth- 
er in the Infinite or the finite, it can always be said, 
to the full extent of that existence and with a ful- 
ness and truth which the world but imperfectly un- 
derstands, that God is there. And Christ therefore, 
in taking upon himself humanity and in fulfilling 
the law in this lower sphere, may be said to have 
brought God down to earth. In being lifted upon 
the Cross and nailed there in the sight of the world, 
and yet in his agony uttering that sublime prayer, 
" Father, forgive them, for they know not what they 
do," he revealed the truth and greatness of God's 
life in his own dying but immortal life; and open- 
ing the way and the hope of salvation, plucked hu- 
manity from its sorrows and its ruins, and gave ever- 
lasting life to men. 



9 2 



ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 



5. — And here, speaking as we now do, of the 
great divine law, that law of Love which is the basis 
of all things that exist, it is necessary to keep in 
mind the discriminations and relations of ideas, and 
to separate things which are apt to be confounded. 
Law and Life, which latter is only another name for 
Love, are inseparable rather than identical. Law 
when rightly estimated, is the eternal announcement 
indicating the constitutive form and the mode of ac- 
tion ; Love, inseparably connected but not identical, 
is the correspondent realization which operates 
within the truths and harmonies of law. Law, stand- 
ing as the interpreter and the voice of the universe, 
is the requisition ; Love is the experience and the 
fulfilment of that which is required. In the natural 
or logical order, law is the antecedent ; but being an 
antecedence of ideas and not of life, of regulative 
form rather than of positive and affirmative existence, 
it is necessary that Love, 'which is the power that 
gives it vitality, should come and convert it into a 
practical principle which renovates and perfects all 
things. 

6. — And now it seems to me to be philosophically 
true, in other words a doctrine of the Absolute Re- 
ligion, that the Law, though eternal as God and un- 
changeable as God, and speaking with a divine and 
universal voice, cannot save us, without that Christ- 



CHRIST AS FULFILMENT OF THE LA W. 



93 



life or Love-life, which the Law requires, and which 
is the Law's fulfilment. To recognize the law, which 
is an intellectual act, is important ; to feel the just- 
ness of its requisitions in the conscience. is important 
also as a preliminary preparation ; but to stop in the 
recognition and the conscientious conviction, with- 
out the possession of the living principle which it 
requires, is necessarily to die. And Christ, there- 
fore, who embodied this living principle and who in 
his essential nature is and ever will be Love, is the 
realization or fulfilment of the Law. 

On these principles man cannot be saved, if sal- 
vation is an inward life, by a mere command, by a 
mere authoritative declaration. Salvation, which is 
the kingdom of God within us, does not come in 
that way. The destiny of man, a destiny which will 
always be fulfilled if it is not prevented by his own 
personal opposition, is to enter into everlasting life 
by becoming a partaker of that life. 

7. — Undoubtedly there are many things mistaken 
for life which are not life. Repentance is not life 
It implies a conviction for sin, but if it stops there 
it is not life. Forgiveness to the extent of entire 
pardon for all our past sins is not necessarily to be 
regarded as life. It implies an exemption from the 
suffering which was originally due to the sins which 
are blotted out ; but it is not necessarily a principle 



94 



ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 



of life. Happiness may be expected to be a result 
of life, an incident which is naturally attendant upon 
it, but it is difficult, on any analysis which may be 
made of it, to affirm that, in itself considered, it is 
the living and life-giving principle of the soul. We 
enter into life, and the principle of life becomes the 
soul's new birth when in the language of Scripture 
we die upon the Cross ; in other words, when by 
means of inward crucifixion we die to self in all 
cases where self-hood becomes selfishness ; and when 
we begin to live for the good of others, not only the 
good of all mankind but of all existences. In other 
words using the terms in the sense in which God 
may be supposed to understand them, we live when 
we love. Love is life. And anything within us 
which is at variance with love is, to that extent, the 
absence and the negation of life. 

8. — In Christ this life was completed. In Him 
the living and life-giving principle of his being, that 
which constituted Him the Son of God, was holy love. 
So that in Him the law of the universe, that law 
which requires us to love God and in loving Him to 
love all that He loves, was fulfilled. 



CHAPTER IX. 

The Second or New Birth. 

I. — The doctrine of the regeneration, otherwise 
known as the doctrine of the New or Second Birth, 
is clearly an announcement of the Scriptures ; and 
though especially exposed to doubt and cavil is not 
without the acceptance and supports of observation 
and philosophical analysis. It is the language of 
the great Teacher ; " Verily, verily, I say unto thee, 
except a man be born again, he cannot see the king- 
dom of God." — John 3 : 3. "Therefore, if any man 
be in Christ," says the Apostle Paul, " he is a new 
creature." Looking at the subject analytically and 
philosophically and as a part of the Absolute Reli- 
gion, the fact of a New or Second Birth admitting 
the fact or existence of such a birth, necessarily im- 
plies the existence of an antecedent birth, which 
may properly be spoken of in the remarks which we 
now propose to offer on the First birth. And this 
First Birth is to be understood as identical with the 
natural birth or the Adamic birth as theologians fre- 



g6 



ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 



quently name it and which the Scriptures some- 
times speak of as the birth of " the flesh." 

2. — And this birth or first form of life is naturally 
the first object of our attention. As the Infinite or 
Absolute of Existence which is the same as God or 
Creator, is the beginning or source of things, and as 
there is nothing which does not come from that In- 
finite source, therefore it follows that the first or 
natural birth of man is and must be from the Infi- 
nite to the finite. But the finite from the moment 
of its birth out of the Infinite, being from that time 
a distinct personality, is itself and not another ; is 
the personal and responsible creature and not the 
Creator; has its own recognized and definite sphere 
of existence in distinction from that of other created 
beings ; an existence which is not only discriminated 
from that of other beings but is really and con- 
sciously its own. The statement itself, too plain to 
need the refinements of argument, may justly be re- 
garded as carrying its own evidence. 

And this is not all. From the moment that cre- 
ated man first knows himself as an existence in the 
finite and as a distinct personality, it is obviously 
and necessarily a law of his being that he seeks and 
finds his centre in himself. As at first he knows 
himself and only himself, he certainly could not be 
expected in the beginning of his existence and with 



THE SECOND, OR NEW BIRTH. gy 

a knowledge limited to himself to seek and find a 
centre out of himself. And accordingly it is true in 
philosophy and is confirmed by observation, that 
turning inwardly and acting from his own centre he 
thinks for himself, feels for himself, wills for himself, 
and primarily and in the first instance draws all his 
hope from himself. He cannot properly be said to 
be self-made ; but being made he cannot in the first 
instance be otherwise than self-centred. And hence 
it is said in the Scriptures, and in reference to the 
limitations that necessarily attend him, that the first 
man is born oi the earth, earthy : in other words, 
with the nature and limitations which are necessarily 
attendant on created existences. And again, in the 
words of Christ himself, " that which is born of the 
flesh is flesh." As much as to say, that the finite is 
born into what it is, namely its own restricted and 
imperfect nature. This is the first birth, the first 
form of life ; and it is not easy to see how it could 
be otherwise than it is. 

3. — It is not surprising therefore, that Christ in 
the conversation with Nicodemus, to which we have 
referred, spoke not only of the first or " flesh" birth, 
but also in the same sentence of a second or spirit 
birth. " That which is born of the flesh, is flesh ; 
and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit." And 
then he added, " marvel not that I said unto you, 
5 



98 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

ye must be born again." Expressions which if closely 
examined imply not only the fact but a moral ne- 
cessity for it. And now, having stated what phi- 
losophy affirms in relation to the first birth, the 
question comes up, what is the moral necessity or 
philosophy of the second birth. Stated in a general 
way, the second birth is a birth back from the finite 
to the Infinite ; from the life of the creature to the 
life of the Creator ; a birth which is both based upon 
the personality of the first birth as its antecedent 
condition, and which takes place without the loss 
of such personality. In the first birth God may be 
said to make or constitute the finite, giving it the 
freedom and independence of a personal existence ; 
and yet without spiritually incarnating Himself in it 
as an indwelling principle of that life. This last 
could not be done in consequence of the inviolabil- 
ity of its freedom, without a consenting action on 
the part of the creature. In the second birth, the 
finite in the exercise of its moral freedom, which is 
an essential element in its personality, has accepted 
God in the central intimacy of its nature as its liv- 
ing and governing principle. So that the human or 
" earthy," as the Scriptures call it, without ceasing 
to be human or earthy, but by renouncing its own 
centre as the source of life, and taking God as its 
centre, does by its own choice and in a true and 



THE SECOND, OR NEW BIRTH. 



99 



high sense become divine. And thus God himself, 
in the case of all those, who by being born with the 
second birth are born in the image of the " Elder 
Brother," who stands before us as the true pattern 
and illustration of the new inward life, may be said 
to the extent in which they bear that image, to be 
truly made manifest in the flesh. 

Such was God's plan from the beginning ; such 
the thought of Infinite Wisdom. It never could have 
been the intention of God, who is essential goodness, 
in establishing the finite personality to separate it 
permanently from the infinite or universal personal- 
ity, and thus raise up an endless antagonism to him- 
self. So that his object, and in the light of the Ab- 
solute Religion, it is the only course He can take, 
is to establish man first in the limited personal life 
of the first birth, and then, by means of the great facts 
involved in the second birth, and in harmony with 
man's own personal recognitions and acceptance, to 
make him one with the universal or divine personal 
life. 

4. — So that the doctrine of the second birth, 
which man in his first or Adamic life does not easily 
understand, and indeed according to the apostle 
Paul does not understand at all in the true sense, is 
no fiction, no mistake ; but on the contrary is a great 
truth in philosophy, and a great realization in expe- 



100 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

rience. But the question may perhaps be asked, 
whether there is really so much difference between 
the two forms of life as to justify the application of 
distinctive terms ; and whether the second form of 
life is anything more or otherwise than a progression 
and very high degree of the first or natural life. In 
answering this question, which will be likely to arise 
in some minds, we remark that the great fact of 
personality in both cases is the same; so that the 
same person is the subject of both forms of experi- 
ence without prejudice to his individualism ; and if 
he were at any time to reach spiritually the position 
of an angel, it would not at all perplex the matter 
of his personal identity. And furthermore, it may 
be admitted, and is undoubtedly true, that there is 
a foundation for the Doctrine of progression ; but 
the doctrine of progression implies, I suppose, that 
there is an end toward which we progress ; an ob- 
ject which the soul is consciously in pursuit of. 
And if we have a right understanding of the matter, 
the end or object may be, and in fact must be, dis- 
tinguished from the successive and progressive steps 
which are prerequisite to it. There are many things 
in these successive steps, which are called and which 
may justly be regarded as facts of religious experi- 
ence, and which in consequence of the real interest 
and value attaching to them, are sometimes errone- 



THE SECOND, OR NEW BIRTH. IO l 

ously mistaken for the second Birth in the true and 
higher sense of the phrase ; but in point of fact they 
are merely steps or incidents in the way and not the 
end or termination of the way. A soul new-born is 
not a process, hut a thing done ; not a doing or being 
done, but a fact accomplished, a definite result and 
definitely and consciously realized ; and one it may 
be added, in which God and angels take an interest 
and in which all heaven rejoices. 

5. — And in my apprehension, whatever may be 
true of progression either before or after the second 
birth, and whatever may be true of continued and 
unbroken personality, there is a line of distinction 
between the first and second form of life, between 
the old Adamic life and the new Christ life, consid- 
ered simply as forms of life, which is not only 
marked and clear, but in point of fact the two things 
are so distinct, the one never going beyond the 
finite, and the other bound up in the golden links of 
the Infinite, that they are incommensurable with 
each other, and in the essence of their nature forever 
stand apart. But this is a matter of so much im- 
portance that I propose to occupy another chapter 
with a contrasted view in some particulars of the 
two forms of life, in the hope to vindicate and make 
clear these positions. 



CHAPTER X. 

Relation of the First to the Second Birth. 

I. — It might be supposed from what has been 
said in the preceding chapter, that the first form of 
life, to which so large a portion of theological atten- 
tion has from time to time been directed, is either 
in its nature essentially evil, or at least must be re 
garded as of no practical position and value in the 
development of man's spiritual history. Such a 
view in either of the aspects which have been inti- 
mated, would be a great mistake. The argument 
on one of the points is clear. It cannot be said on 
any just philosophical grounds that God creates sin. 
The eternal truth rejects any such affirmation. And 
therefore man's first birth, at the moment of its ori- 
gin, has and must have the character of innocency. 
But this is not the whole statement in the case. 
Standing alone in the relative incompleteness of its 
incipient condition, but naturally preferring, in the 
consciousness of its freedom and power to make its 
own way and to do its own acts in the universe of 



RELATION OF FIRST TO SECOND BIRTH. IC >3 

things, it necessarily finds itself at a very early pe- 
riod, and perhaps in its very first acts, exposed to 
the greatest hazards. Its innocence is no certain 
pledge of its security. Its innocence involving the 
fact of its freedom becomes the natural, perhaps the 
inevitable precursor of its sin. 

2. — The view of the Scriptures on this subject is 
supposed to be familiar to all. The Absolute Reli- 
gion, or religion as founded on philosophical observa- 
tion and analysis, harmonizes with it. And in the 
support of this last assertion, which carries with it 
consequences which involve the interests of human- 
ity, let us delay a little and examine the subject in 
its details. 

We first see man coming from the creating hand 
of God. He stands before us as the Adamic man, 
erect, self-centred and free. No child of Satan ; but 
a child of the living God, and constituted in a very 
important sense in the image of God. And it is the 
fact that he is thus constituted, being as really ex- 
istent and free in the human sphere as God is in the 
infinite or divine sphere, which makes his danger. 
He stands sublime in his independence. He occu- 
pies an eminence above all other created things. 
His joy is as great as the greatness of his position. 
But can he stand alone ? That is the question. 
With all the independence and power which he act- 



104 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

ually possesses, is it true that he either is or can be 
morally secure amid a universe of existences and re- 
lations, no rights or claims of which are ever allowed 
to be violated ? 

3. — It is unquestionable that man knew well 
both the fact and the nature of the power and the 
freedom which God had given him. God had not 
only given them to him ; but with the gift had given 
also, without which they would have been valueless, 
the consciousness which recognized them as his own. 
But is it necessary to add there was one thing which 
he did not know? He had no adequate compre- 
hension, and in consequence of the necessary limita- 
tion and finiteness of his powers it was impossible 
that he should have, of the infinitude of obligations 
that rested upon him. And still less, standing firm- 
ly in the sphere of his independence and trusting in 
the newborn joy of his own strength alone, was he 
able to fulfil these obligations. To accept the aid 
which the divine benevolence offered him had the 
appearance of giving up his independence. His in- 
dependence seemed to be, as it really was, the glory 
of his nature. To part with it even in the smallest 
degree and under, any circumstances, was striking a 
blow at the essence of his life. Blinded by the 
splendor of the gifts which had been imparted to 
him, he virtually asked God who had made him in 



RELATION OF FIRST TO SECOND BIRTH. 105 

this grand incipient completeness, to stand aside and 
let him alone. 

How could he being a man be otherwise than he 
was ; or how, being situated as he was, could he do 
otherwise than he did ? The law which required 
him to fulfil every duty, — a law as limitless in its 
applications as the infinitude of existing facts and 
relations, — was upon him ; and it could not be oth- 
erwise. And undertaking in his ignorance to fulfil 
it in his own strength, — a strength which was not 
strong enough to renounce itself under such circum- 
stances, — he necessarily failed and fell. 

4. — Such are the essential facts which present 
themselves to our observation as we theoretically 
and practically study the history of the human race ; 
and which are more or less clearly revealed in the 
facts and incidents of the biblical narrative. Man 
fell. The weight of his own glory inseparable from 
the inviolability of his personal and responsible ex- 
istence, combined as it was with the position in 
which he was necessarily placed, bore him down. 
It was of the nature of a moral necessity \ but it 
was not without the signatures of divine goodness 
and wisdom. His fall as it is denominated, great 
and terrible as it was, carried with it the noblest 
testimony which could possibly be given of the high 
and glorious nature of the gifts which had been im- 

5* 



106 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

parted. A testimony so striking and decisive that 
the universe, which is interested in all that pertains 
to man and which cannot live upon doubts, could 
not afford to be without it. It was necessary in or- 
der to establish a basis for the ever-growing devel- 
opment and harmonies of the universe, in order to 
build the pillars of the future in eternal strength, 
not only that man should be free, but that he should 
be known to be free. The fall of man settles it for- 
ever, that the manhood which his Creator gave him 
was a divine reality and not a pretentious sem- 
blance. 

5. — When in my early life I read in some of the 
old Puritan theologians that there was wisdom and 
glory in the fall of man and that great good had re- 
sulted from it, I failed to see the truth .of their dec- 
larations. And if in the sense of my comparative 
ignorance, I had not the strength entirely to reject 
their statements, I certainly had not the ability to 
comprehend them. I reserved them as I have done 
in many other instances, for further meditation. 
And my thought to-day, subject to the corrections 
of any higher wisdom, is, that they were right in the 
substance of their meaning, though imperfect and 
liable to lead to error in their expression of it. The 
fall of man was and is a good, because it was and is 
the only testimony which can settle, beyond the 



RELATION OF FIRST TO SECOND BIRTH. 



I07 



reach of doubt and cavil, the question of the com- 
pleteness of his moral nature in the matter of his 
moral liberty. 

The history of six thousand years with its record 
of deceptions and cruelties, of suspicions, calumnies 
and hatreds, with its usurping tyrannies and bloody 
wars, and not without the bright inheritance of vir- 
tuous purposes and noble deeds, leaves no room to 
doubt, that man in the greatness of his nature was 
created with the capacity to discriminate between 
right and wrong and to do either good or evil. But 
this decisive testimony which removes all doubt, 
could not have been reached with anything short of 
the multitude of sad and guilty facts which are in- 
volved in it. 

6. — We pass now to another view. It can be 
said of the first form of life that it is not only not 
evil in its nature, but that it sustains relations and 
secures results of the greatest importance. Its 
greatness and glory, with all its admitted liabilities 
to error and transgression, are evident from this, that 
without the first birth the second birth, with all the 
hopes and honors which attach to it would have 
been an impossibility. The later or heavenly birth, 
it is true, is born of heavenly influences flowing 
down to it from heavenly sources and elevating the 
soul to its new position ; but these influences gain 



108 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

no admittance and of course exert no power until 
the soul, with the key of its inalienable freedom, 
opens the door for their entrance and accepts them 
as its own. God undoubtedly is to be regarded as 
a party in this great work ; he cannot be separated 
from the divine influences which have been men- 
tioned ; and without Him nothing is done effectual- 
ly. • But there are moral as well as physical impossi- 
bilities ; and God cannot do that which is impossi- 
ble to be done. It is impossible for God to bestow 
upon men the attributes of freedom and power in 
sincerity, and yet at the same time to destroy, or to 
interfere with and perplex their appropriate position 
and action. If there is anything which may be re- 
garded as fully settled, either in sound philosophy 
or in any generally accepted theology, it is the posi- 
tion, that the gift of moral freedom implies and ne- 
cessitates the impossibility of its violation. So that 
the first or oldest birth, whether regarded as pure 
and innocent at the period of its origin, or with 
some inherent taint of evil as some suppose, or 
what seems to be and what we think must be the 
truth in the case, with innocence attended with a 
liability to evil, by an arrangement which, growing 
out of the nature of things, could not be otherwise 
than it is, places the crown as the result of its histo- 
ry and experience upon the head and heart of the 



RELATION OF FIRST TO SECOND BIRTH. 



IO9 



second birth. And in this sense at least, Adam, in 
the line and the destinies of humanity, becomes as 
the Scriptures represent him, the progenitor of 
Christ; Adam falls that Christ may rise; the Ad- 
amic man perishes that the Christ or Christian man, 
made strong by the element of a new life may come 
and take his place and may live forever. 

7. — But proceeding a step further, we next in- 
quire what is the true and interior nature of this 
remarkable work. There is a remark of St. Augus- 
tine which indicates what this nature is, "Amores 
duo duas civitates fecerunt" Two loves have made 
two cities ; the one Babylon, the other Jerusalem ; the 
one a city of discord and unrighteousness, the other 
a city of harmony and rectitude. Looking at the 
matter philosophically, it is not necessary to deny 
that these two loves are the same in their individu- 
al nature ; and are only discriminated and separated 
by the diversity in their applications and objects. 
If man had not been created with the love of him- 
self, would he have possessed the measurement, by 
which he was required to estimate his love to his 
neighbor? We read repeatedly in the writings of 
Paul, " thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself." 
And in other places, in expressions of still broader 
and higher import, " thou shalt love the Lord thy 
God with all thy heart, and thy neighbor as thy- 



HO ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

self; " identifying the love of God, so far as its na- 
ture is concerned, with the love of our neighbor, 
and in that way as it seems to me, identifying the 
love of our Maker, in respect to its nature at least, 
with the love of man. 

It is true that the love of God is greatly higher 
than that of our neighbor, because while tne love 
of our neighbor extends to and embraces humanity, 
the love of God reaching far above and far below, 
includes the love of all existences. As President 
Edwards in one of the most remarkable of his works 
expresses it, it is the " love of being in general; " in 
other words, love of everything which exists and is 
susceptible of being loved. And yet it seems to us 
it cannot well be doubted, in the light of a candid 
and careful analysis, that the love of God is the 
same in its essential nature with the love of oui 
neighbor, which in its kind or nature is the same 
with that of ourselves. So that the love of God, 
looking at the matter either in the light of the 
Scriptures or of the highest reason, is the expansion 
of the love of ourselves, which in the lower or com- 
parative sense is the infinitely small, to what in the 
higher or absolute sense is the infinitely great ; in 
other words, from a sphere of action which is meas- 
ured by individualism, to a sphere of action whose 
universality places it beyond the possibility of meas- 



RELA TION OF FIRST TO SECOND BIRTH, i 1 1 

urement. And this statement, in harmony with 
what was intimated in a former passage, involves 
the comparative measurement of the first and sec- 
ond birth, and makes them, in the matter of extent 
or degree, incommensurable. 

8. — Upon this subject, the greatness of the sec- 
ond Birth, we have no language which can well ex- 
press our feelings. Perhaps we ought to say again, 
and still more explicitly, that we understand by the 
second Birth something more than the ordinary 
forms, valuable as they are, of transitional religious 
experience. A man may be greatly exercised in re- 
ligious experiences, and indeed it is often the case, 
without his being able to say in the higher and true 
sense that he is born of God. The second birth is 
the soul found in the image of God, not merely in 
the matter of moral freedom but of universal love ; 
the soul expanded from the consideration of self 
alone to the regard and love of every other being ; 
the out-growth and the divine consummation of the 
soul's antecedent and preparatory history. It gains 
a position in which, harmonizing with God, God be- 
comes its teacher ; and in which, going hand in hand 
with its great Creator, it henceforth marches onward 
forever to learn, forever to love, and forever to en- 
joy. 

9. — But the question still remains, where does 



112 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

this heavenly love come from, and under what con- 
ditions does it come. We answer, it is the gift of 
God ; perhaps it would be better to say, it is the in- 
flowing of God. The latter term implies that it 
comes by the necessities of law; the former, that it 
depends on the uncontrolled decisions of volition. 
If we are right in the views we entertain, it is a part 
of God's nature, without which he would be some- 
thing less than God, to flow out or communicate 
himself, in the attributes of truth and good, to all be- 
ings that are capable of receiving and are willing to 
receive. He chooses to do this, because his nature 
never allows him to choose otherwise ; and thus 
the choice which, without the nature, would be 
giving, being sustained and sanctified by the nature, 
becomes an in-flowing. If God is Love, which tne 
Scriptures as well as philosophy affirm him to be, 
there can be no difficulty here. 

But there is still something remaining. This 
great and desirable result, which has the heart of the 
Infinite in its favor, depends nevertheless upon 
man ; at least in this particular, that this in-flowing 
from the divine heights can never reach him, can 
never become the baptism of the soul and the soul's 
regeneration, without his own consent. It is when 
he can truly say " not my will but thine be done," 
that his consent is fully given. God could not make 



RELATION OF FIRST TO SECOND BIRTH. 



113 



him in the true greatness of his nature, and did not 
make him, without giving him this mighty preroga- 
tive. 

10. — And now, let us look a moment in another 
direction ; and what do we see ? The second birth 
in any other way, or on any other conditions, be- 
comes an impossibility. Is it possible for God to 
raise man to that high position, with the opposition 
of his own will standing against it ? And more than 
this, take away the freedom of the will, which is the 
completing or consummating element in man's na- 
ture, and there is nothing to be raised. It is true 
that freedom of the will does not constitute the 
whole of man ; but it is also true that man is not 
and cannot be constituted as man without it. The 
new birth, which implies that the soul is not and 
cannot be a machine, the new-birth which is in the 
highest sense a grand moral, spiritual and responsi- 
ble realization, could never have had a place without 
the antecedents of man's first birth of freedom and 
personality. The statement is an argument ; and 
the argument is conviction. And therefore it is we 
say, look at man as he is, and call him man or devil, 
inasmuch as a name cannot alter the fact ; and it is 
impossible not to bow with reverence in the pres- 
ence of human nature, which, with all its liabilities 



1 14 



ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 



to evil, still holds in its hand the possibilities of 
heavenly and eternal life. 

II. — And now, taking our position on such 
grounds, is it out of place to utter a few words in 
favor of our common humanity, even in those forms 
which have the sad aspect of degradation and sor- 
row ? Is there one so low that he wholly loses the 
dignity of his nature, and lies below the notice of a 
sympathizing tear? The Adamic man, even in the 
degradation of his fall, holds in his hand the key of 
universal good. Go with me to yonder prison, which 
contains within its iron bars, and shuts out from the 
light of day, the thief and the drunkard, the robber 
and the murderer ; and in those countenances of sor- 
row and of crime, canst thou not see something 
which speaks to thee of a common brotherhood, 
something which inspires in thy saddened bosom 
sentiments of forgiveness and hope ? I speak for 
myself, but I am confident, that I find in the emo- 
tions of my own heart the common thought and 
feeling of our common humanity. 

And if these sentiments are the out-birth of a 
sound philosophy in relation to our initiative or Ad- 
amic humanity, they cannot fail to inspire feelings 
of reverence and love for that great Book in which 
it is said, " He maketh his sun to rise on the evil 
and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and 



RELATION OF FIRST TO SECOND BIRTH. 



115 



on the unjust." And where we read, " Father, for- 
give them, for they know not what they do." And 
where it is said again, " Neither do I condemn thee ; 
go, and sin no more." And again, " This day thou 
shalt be with me in Paradise." 



CHAPTER XL 

Relation of Moral Evil to Freedom, and its Remedy, 

I. — It is implied in the fact of forgiveness, to 
which reference was made at the close of the last 
chapter, in connection with the forgiving and loving 
principles involved in the mystery of the Cross, 
that there is something which needs to be forgiven ; 
in other words, that man has gone astray and sin- 
ned. This fact brings up the inquiry, upon which 
there has been from time to time so much discus- 
sion, of the origin of moral evil. The view of the 
Absolute Religion, which is also the doctrine of the 
Scriptures when properly interpreted and under- 
stood, is that moral evil in its various forms and de- 
grees is necessarily incidental to the facts which are 
involved in the constitution of man's nature. In 
other words, the liability to sin is a necessary result 
of the great faculties and capabilities, which are 
man's inheritance. 

2. — It is the Scriptural statement that man was 
created in the " image of God." A statement which 



MORAL EVIL. ny 

is entitled on grounds of observation and reason to 
be accepted in its essential meaning, although it re- 
quires to be modified in its import by the considera- 
tion that man is finite and the Creator infinite. But 
with this modification kept in view, which implies 
that the likeness in the creation exists in the out- 
lines and essential nature of being, rather than in 
the amount or degree of being, it still remains, that 
man was created in the divine image, in the first 
place, perceptively ; in other words, in the posses- 
sion of those powers which are employed in the ac- 
quisition of knowledge. And if the limitation, to 
which we have referred, excludes the attribute of 
omniscience, it accepts both the possibility and the 
fact of such a degree of knowledge as is appropri- 
ate to a finite being. Secondly, man was created 
in the image of God sentimentively ; that is to say, 
he was created with that distinct and more interior 
department of our mental nature which is some- 
times appropriately expressed by the term sensibili- 
ties ; and which, in being the sphere of the senti- 
ments, originates feeling in its various forms of emo- 
tions, desires and feelings of obligation, in distinc- 
tion from mere perceptive acts. And thirdly, he was 
created with the power or faculty of the will ; that 
great and controlling department of the mind, where 
we are to look for the foundations, or at least the 



H8 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

necessary conditions, of personality and accountabil- 
ity. In all these important respects there can be no 
hesitation in saying that man was created in the 
image of God. And as a resultant of these attri- 
butes of being, and as a necessary fulfilment of the 
statement that he was born in the divine image, he 
was created self-centred ; a being not only endued 
with living power, but created in the possession of 
absolute moral freedom within the sphere of his 
personal existence and activity. 

-3. — So that if we rightly conceive of the princi- 
ples of his birth, man was created a child of God, 
with a reality of freedom and of personal responsi- 
bility in his own finite sphere, analogous to that of 
God himself in his infinite sphere. The attribute 
of volitional and moral freedom, with that practical 
self-reliance which grows out of it, makes the self- 
centred position complete. So that man, being 
what he is and created as he is, is necessarily born a 
self-hood ; and that self-hood, claiming on the ground 
of moral freedom a likeness and relationship with 
the self-hood of God, is not more a necessary condi- 
tion or form of his life, than it is the foundation of 
his greatness and glory. And accordingly, though 
as man he is an out-birth from God and is necessari- 
ly inferior to God, he stands within his own sphere 
of life, and in virtue of the psychical and moral gifts 



MORAL EVIL. 



II 9 



which have been imparted to him, essentially a de- 
ific being ; and is truly and emphatically born in the 
image of God and made a son of God. And that 
which, more than anything else, although none of 
his other mental attributes could be dispensed with, 
gives him this high place, and that which establishes 
him as one born in the image of God, and makes 
him a true child of God, is his inviolable freedom. 

4. — In being an out-birth from the Infinite, man 
is not on that account infinite himself, but on the 
contrary is characterized, and necessarily so, by 
finiteness. An infinite out-birth, if it could be a 
thing conceivable, would be essentially a contradic- 
tion in terms. A creation or out-birth, which could 
be characterized as infinite, would not be an out- 
birth, but an identity, So that man, in the primal 
principles and facts of his creation, is born as he is 
and was, because he could not be born otherwise ; 
made in the image of God, and therefore in an im- 
portant sense deific, but not infinite. But here 
comes an incident of his history which is worthy of 
notice. The law and the facts of his being are such, 
that while they constitute the necessity and the glo- 
ry of his existence, they draw the lines of separation, 
and place him, in the first instance, not only in the 
isolation of self-hood, but for a time at least in prac- 
tical antagonism with everything else. He stands 



I2 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

up in the conscious greatness of his individualism, 
which is only another name for his self-hood ; and 
in the power and in the just pride of self-affirmation, 
his first utterance is necessarily an interrogation of 
the universe. He says, I am a man; let no one 
touch me ; let no one violate the sphere of my activ- 
ity; let no one attempt to control me. That proud 
voice which in affirming itself and ascertaining its 
own position, interrogates and warns all others, 
sounds through all heights and all depths, and pro- 
claims the birth of a deific son. God himself stands 
aside, as it were, in deep reverence and love of his 
own mighty work ; and will not, and in fact cannot, 
without a self-contradiction, act adversely in the 
violation, in any degree whatever, of that divine at- 
tribute of freedom which He has given never to be 
recalled. 

5. — But, although God had given man freedom, 
there was another thing which he did not and could 
not give. He did not and could not give him the 
right to violate the position and the rights of any 
other being which exists, whether great or small. 
All beings have their position and rights as distinctly 
marked and as clearly inviolable as are those of man. 
So that, although man was born into the position of 
self-hood with all its possibilities and responsibili- 
ties, yet the great law of the universe, which God 



MORAL EVIL. I2 I 

himself could not abrogate or alter, requires him to 
exercise that self-hood in all its tendencies and acts, 
in harmony with the rights and the highest good 
of all others. The soul in its self-hood, with the 
freedom and power of its self-hood, and yet without 
the knowledge which might enable it to act in har- 
mony with the rights and claims of all other beings, 
is the soul in its first birth ; the soul, in the language 
sometimes employed by theologians, in its Adamic 
life. And it is here, in this position of the soul, 
great and wonderful as it is, that we find the possi- 
bility and the practical beginnings of moral evil. It 
acts, because it has the freedom and the power to 
act ; and is determined to act, because it is justly in 
love with its freedom and power ; but in its blindness 
it is constantly doing wrong, because in breaking 
the law to which even freedom is bound to submit, 
it violates the harmonies of the universe. But all 
these sins and errors, originating in blindness of 
mind, are forgiven and blotted out in the principles 
and experiences of the Cross, as we have already 
explained them. And the soul, prepared by what 
it has passed through and impressed with a new and 
deeper sense of the divine wisdom, is born into that 
higher and better position which is not inappropri- 
ately called the second birth. 

6. — We can perhaps illustrate these views and 
6 



122 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

make them clearer by calling to mind that the state 
of things which we have just now described, is es- 
sentially, and almost precisely, what we daily see in 
little children. Their freedom, without which in 
their sad stupidity, they would be but little better 
than mere blocks of stone or wood, sparkles in their 
eyes, sounds in their voice, and is a living activity 
in their hands and feet. And this very freedom, 
without which they would cease to be true children, 
constitutes the parents' highest joy. The parents 
look upon the exuberance of their bliss in their run- 
nings to and fro, and in their thousand experimental 
activities, with an ecstasy of pleasure ; regarding it 
as the presage of the reality and the fruits of man- 
hood and womanhood. And yet the first thing 
they do, is to place this incipient freedom, which is 
the seed of moral life and without which moral life 
is an impossibility, under law. They tell their chil- 
dren not to do this thing and not to do that thing ; 
and the child, overrunning with gladness in the 
possession of his personality, seldom fails in some of 
the particulars which are placed under prohibition, 
to go contrary to the orders of the loving parents. 
And the consequence is, that they not only go astray, 
but they suffer for it ; and there is no restoration for 
them and no happiness for them until they are will- 
ing to place themselves under parental direction, or 



MORAL EVIL. 



I23 



what is the same thing, to place their wills under 
the wills of their parents. 

7. — This analogous illustration helps us to under- 
stand man's position in relation to God. The child 
who disobeys suffers ; and the human race in its dis- 
obedience to God suffers ; but the love of the parent 
comes to the rescue of the child ; and so the love of 
God, incarnated and manifested in Christ, comes to 
the rescue of the race ; and in both cases promptly, 
sincerely, and so far as the possibilities of the case 
will allow, effectually. All that is wanting on the' 
part of man is those dispositions, including the pen- 
itent recognition of his sin, which will secure obedi 
ence. The great law of the universe which requires 
a regard for the rights and happiness of all possible 
existences, is an imperative one. It is a law so clear 
that it needs no proof except what it carries in itself 
in the fact of its own intuitional affirmation. And 
yet it is a law which cannot by any possibility be 
obeyed, except in one way ; namely, by placing the 
human will in the keeping of the Divine will. And 
this, it cannot well be doubted, was the interior 
meaning and object of the law of Paradise, namely, 
to adjust permanently the relation of the human and 
the Divine will in order to man's guidance and good. 

8. — But the question may suggest itself here 
whether this is not a hard case for man ; endowed 



124 



ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 



as he is with freedom, and yet in the exercise of 
that freedom without which he would cease to be a 
man, doomed to errors which bring him into con- 
demnation and suffering. It might perhaps be re- 
garded so if this were the termination of his history, 
and if there were no escape from a position so un- 
looked for and so sad. But the Fall, as it is theo- 
logically expressed, or that series of events in which 
freedom in its early and irrepressible love of itself, 
took the position of disobedience to law and thus 
became rebellion, though a terrible evil in itself, is 
incidentally a gain in its results. And the reason 
of this is found in what has already been intimated 
in relation to the love and goodness of God. Man 
.sins and suffers; but he is not deserted. "Can a 
woman forget her sucking child, that she should not 
have compassion on the son of her womb ? Yea, 
they may forget, yet will I not forget thee." Great 
words, uttered by an ancient Prophet in the solitary 
mountains of Judea ; but which belong to all lands 
and nations. And what then, having done all that 
he consistently could do by instruction or in other 
ways, to prevent the fall, shall he do now that the 
fall has become a reality? Revealing himself in the 
divine analogy of his works, he teaches us that He 
does just what the true earthly parent does ; only in 
a higher degree and with unspeakably greater re- 



MORAL EVIL. 



125 



suits. In the first place, so great is his love that he 
allows them to suffer, or perhaps better he cannot 
help their suffering, because sin and suffering neces- 
sarily go together. He lets them suffer so long as 
they remain in disobedience, because there is no 
other way. The ways of God are not accidents, but 
wisdoms; not the uncertainties and the variations 
of time, but the permanencies of eternity. 

9. — It is possible that some will say here, if free- 
dom is necessary to the realization and the constitu- 
tion of their manhood, then the surrender of the 
will to God is practically giving up the great charac- 
teristic of humanity, and is in fact the withdrawal 
and the annihilation of the great essential element 
which makes man what he is. It was perhaps this 
fear in part, in man's incipient and Adamic condition, 
which led him into the disobedience of rejecting the 
divine command. But it was only a fear, and not a 
verity. God never proposed, and never can propose, 
without violence to the most glorious truths and sym- 
pathies of his nature, to violate man's freedom, or to 
destroy it, or injure it in any way or degree, under 
any circumstances or in any place; either in the in- 
cipient Adamic humanity or in the perfected Christ 
humanity; in heaven, earth, or hell; in time or in 
eternity. All that He proposes, and all that He 
asks, in view of the creative and sustaining relation- 



126 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

ships of his eternal Fatherhood, is, that He may be 
allowed to exercise his parental interest and care, 
by guiding or helping to guide man in those cases, 
(and this is true of all cases of voluntary action,) 
which, in consequence of their infinitely varied rela- 
tions, are in many essential respects beyond the 
reach and judgment of a finite mind. Cases where, 
if he is not guided by a Mind that understands this 
infinity of remote facts and relations, his fall becomes 
a moral necessity. It is the surrender of the will 
under these circumstances and to this extent, which 
God demands in virtue of his paternal necessities ; 
and its refusal on the part of man is, and must be 
his certain and necessary ruin. But such a surren- 
der of the will as this, is not the destruction of the 
will, and is not the destruction of humanity ; but on 
the contrary is the perfection of the will's action by 
harmonizing it with the truth, and is the human 
will harmonizing with the will of God in the divine 
marriage of a common thought and purpose ; and 
instead of being the destruction, is the preservation 
and the perfection of humanity. 

10. — The doctrine of the Fall then understood 
in its principles, stands before us not merely in the 
literal statements of the Scripture narrative, but as 
one of the. great problems of philosophy, which the 
truth vindicates and accepts. And it may be ac- 



MORAL EVIL. 1 27 

cepted as a moral axiom, that whatever harmonizes 
with the truth will be found all for the best. It was 
best that man should be created as a self-centred 
existence or self-hood, with the freedom appropriate 
to it. It was best that he should demonstrate to 
himself and the universe, that he had a self-con- 
sciousness, a positive sphere of action, a personal 
responsibility, a divine freedom ; and thereby vindi- 
cate his deific descent. It was best that God 
should leave him to the possibilities of the Fall, and 
that he should fall if in his freedom he chose to do 
so ; not only for the reason which has been intimat- 
ed, that he might be assured and all others might 
be assured of these great attributes of his nature ; 
but that the love of God might be summoned to 
meet the exigency of his unhappy disobedience and 
overthrow. It was best that he should suffer the 
sorrows that are always born of sin, that in the 
greatness of his anguish he might cry out for 
help. It was best that the miseries which in the 
Fall flow out of the First Birth, should lead to the 
blood-bought inheritance of the Second Birth ; that 
self-hood renouncing its personal and selfish limita- 
tions, should grow up into universal-hood ; that an 
in-dwelling Adam should be exchanged for an in- 
dwelling Christ ; and the Life that perishes for the 
Life that lives forever. 



CHAPTER XII. 

The Divine Purposes. 

I. — The doctrine of the Divine Purposes, to 
some extent in the more general form of Providen- 
tial arrangements, but especially when regarded as 
including the doctrines of Decrees and Election, and 
any and all results which rest specifically upon the 
decisions of the Divine will, has met with serious 
objections in the minds of many. And yet it can- 
not well be doubted, that the analogies of nature 
and the suggestions and arguments of a broad and 
reflective philosophy will be likely to discover an 
important and perhaps an indispensable truth in 
that direction. Our views will of course be based 
upon the accepted idea of the existence of God. 
And reasoning upon this basis, it must not be for- 
gotten, that the facts of the universe, whatever they 
may be, embody the wisdom of the Great Mind of 
the universe ; and the wisdom of the great superin- 
tending Mind cannot possibly be separated from his 
goodness. 



THE DIVINE PURPOSES. 129 

And the first question which arises is, what has 
He done? In other words, what are the results of 
his mental decisions ? We shall all agree I suppose, 
that we find the answer to this question in what we 
everywhere behold around us. Looking especially 
at man, who is commonly regarded as the greatest 
of His works, we find the condition of things so ex- 
isting, which implies that they are so originated and 
so arranged, that there are innumerable diversities 
of rich and poor, of learned and ignorant, of those 
who are bowed in sickness and affliction, and those 
who are in prosperity, of men in palaces and men in 
dungeons, of men honored by virtues and men de- 
graded by crimes. It may even be said that there 
are no two situations and no two characters which 
are precisely alike. 

2. — Now it must be admitted that this state of 
things is not at variance with the thought and pur- 
pose of the great controlling Mind, who is at the 
head of all things. He has done it ; and in the ex- 
ercise of the highest wisdom, he intended to do it. 
It harmonizes with his idea of what is for the best ; 
it constitutes a part of the divine plan — a plan 
which may safely appeal to the highest human 
reason for its acceptance and approval. It is possi- 
ble that those who hold adverse or unfavorable 

positions, those who pine on beds of sickness or 
6* 



130 



ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 



look out upon the bright world through the grates 
of a prison, may not always clearly see the evidences 
of wisdom or even of justice. But when we look 
away from individual cases which considered alone 
might perplex the judgment, and contemplate crea- 
tion as a great system, in which the highest wisdom 
as well as the highest benevolence is called upon to 
develop itself, I think we cannot fail to approve of 
and to accept the wisdom of that grand creative 
idea, which harmonizes the central unity of things 
with the greatest possible diversities. In other 
words we find the leading principle of a philosophic 
answer to the objections that are made to the great 
doctrine of unity and diversity. Look abroad upon 
outward nature. And can it be affirmed that it is 
less beautiful or less wisely ordered, because it is not 
an unvaried and level expanse, but is diversified by 
rocks, valleys and mountains? And what would 
humanity be, where would be the interest attached 
to it, if everything were reduced to a dead level, 
without diversities of thought, without varieties of 
action, without the hills and valleys and rocky and 
rugged places of comparative situation, with all poor 
and none rich, or all rich and none poor : so that a 
man would find it impossible to be interested in the 
welfare of his neighbor, and still less to do him 
good. Such a state of things, like a dead level in 



THE DIVINE PURPOSES. 



131 



the material world, would answer perhaps for a day 
or an hour, but would soon become a profitless and 
hopeless stupidity. 

3. — And now, when we attempt to look more 
carefully into the origin of things or rather into the 
causes of things, not merely the beginning but the 
intelligent cause which makes their beginning, we 
are obliged to say, since we have nothing else to say, 
that the causative principle of this state of things is 
God himself. And we mean by this, that God 
stands at the head not only of creation but of the 
diversities of creation ; not only of existence but of 
all the modifications and varieties of existence. God 
makes the sunshine, and God makes the storm. 
The springtime and the harvest ; the summer and 
the winter are the Lord's : God made the mount- 
ains : the hills and the valleys also are the works of 
his hand. The rivers and the fountains are his : and 
he makes mighty seas and oceans. The universe in 
some important sense, is the reflex of himself; and 
its infinite diversities are the expression of the wis- 
dom and the boundless resources which are hidden 
in the infinitude of his nature. And this causative 
relation which makes him the responsible head of 
all things, extends to things intellectual and moral 
as well as physical ; to man as well as to outward 
nature ; to every incident of his being and every 



!32 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

form of his activity. In the theological and dog- 
matic form of expression, to which we are now 
directing attention, it is a matter of purpose and 
decree. God sustains not merely a permissive, but 
a positive and authoritative relation. He has " de- 
creed" the facts of existence, he has "elected" the 
course of individuals and empires. 

4. — And all this, notwithstanding it seems to 
sound harshly, we can admit and affirm, when the 
matter is stated in its full extent and placed in its 
proper relations. Let it not be forgotten that in 
the universality of this grand " decree " and in the 
discriminations of that authoritative process which 
" elects" one vessel to " honor and another to dis- 
honor," he embraces as a part of his scheme the fact 
of man's moral freedom and its inviolability; the 
immutable distinction of right and wrong ; the rela- 
tion of wrong to punishment and of punishment to 
wrong ; the principle of growth by means of exertion 
and trial ; the mighty compensations of time, which 
as time cannot be separated from eternity are 
known only to himself; the adjustment of diversi- 
ties which are seen, with harmonies that are neces- 
sarily unseen, except by minds that can embrace all 
facts and all relations ; that though some fall and 
some rise, yet there " is not a sparrow that falleth 
to the ground without his notice," that though he 



THE DIVINE PURPOSES. 133 

saw his own Son nailed to the cross, yet he placed 
upon his head the crown which shall shine through 
the eternity of ages ; — let these and many other 
things be remembered and taken into account in 
the consideration of this great subject. All that a 
proper regard for the truth requires is, that the 
proper breadth may be given to the problem ; that 
it may be considered in its universality and in the 
measureless extent of its possibilities. And whether 
it be called " divine purpose," or " decree," or u elec- 
tion" or by any other name, it holds a truth, when 
properly discriminated and set in its true light, 
which philosophy accepts, and practical religion has 
never been able to dispense with. 

5. — But if we must accept moral freedom at the 
same time that we accept divine supremacy, the 
question arises, — By what process can they be harmo- 
nized with each other ? Where are the philosophic 
methods which can reconcile what either is, or at 
least has the appearance of being, a positive contra- 
diction ? If we take the ground that they are really 
contradictions, we must of course admit that they 
cannot be reconciled. But in point of fact there are, 
and can be no contradictions in the universe of God. 
A contradiction in the thoughts or acts of God, or 
in anything which makes a part of his created uni- 
verse, necessarily implies an imperfection in his char- 



134 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

acter entirely at variance with the accepted ideas 
of the completeness of his knowledge and wisdom. 
Collect and collate the facts that are presented to 
notice around us, facts mental as well as material ; 
facts which pertain to the spiritual sphere of things 
as well as those which belong to the outward and 
tangible ; and go further and establish all theories 
and systems which legitimately flow from them ; 
and it is true of one and all of them that they do 
and must harmonize. 

We do not say, nor would it be proper to say, 
that their harmony is always perceived ; which is a 
very different thing. But the harmony exists, 
whether it be perceived or not. As the facts in 
their vast multitude overleap all known limitations, 
it is not possible that the human mind, in its ac- 
knowledged finiteness, should understand and ad- 
just them all, either in themselves as objective facts 
or in their subjective relations. And this state of 
things lays the foundation for the exercise of belief 
existing in matters beyond the reach of the senses 
and even of consciousness. A true philosophy, one 
which includes God as well as man, embraces and 
affirms the doctrine of faith. And what we cannot 
understand as a matter of direct perception, we are 
still justified, on appropriate occasions, in having 
faith beyond the limit of the revelation of the un- 



THE DIVINE PURPOSES. 



135 



derstanding. And hence I think we may see a true 
philosophical spirit in a remark of Mr. Locke, where 
he says ; — " I own freely to you the weakness of my 
understanding, that, though it be unquestionable 
that there is omnipotence and omniscience in God 
our Maker, and though I cannot have a clearer per- 
ception of anything than that I am free, yet I can- 
not make [meaning undoubtedly that he could not 
explain and clear up in all respects how it should be 
so,] freedom in man consistent with omnipotence 
and omniscience in God, though I am as fully persua- 
ded of both as of any truth I most firmly assent to ; 
and therefore I have long since given up the consid- 
eration of that question, resolving all into this short 
conclusion, that if it be possible for God to make a 
free agent, then man is free, though I see not the 
way of it." 

6. — Humanity needs a God who is a reality and 
not a pretence. I think that man had rather be 
under a tyrant than under a liberty which is with- 
out law, or under an authority which gives no pro- 
tection. God, who is neither the weakness of a 
semblance nor the cruelty of an injustice, is the pro- 
tector of the weak and the avenger of the injured. 
He is no tyrant ; but we recognize both wisdom and 
justice when we say he is God. 

There are moral evidences as well as intellectual ; 



j 36 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

evidences which are based upon human action. If 
the positive authority of God culminating in results 
which lead intelligent men to speak of his decrees, 
elections, and sovereign purposes, is not merely a 
dogmatism but a truth, it will be found to be 
strongly sustained as such by the practical results 
In the lives and acts of those who receive it. And 
undoubtedly the evidence from this source is such 
as to arrest attention. Among the men in all ages 
of the world who have been distinguished for firm- 
ness of purpose and endurance of trial, there have 
been a large number who have adopted these views 
of God. Such were the Waldenses, whose touching 
story will be remembered as long as the lofty cliffs 
shalLstand, from which in the support of their opin- 
ions, they were thrown headlong and dashed to 
pieces. 

Such were the Covenanters of Scotland, whose 
great theme was the sovereignty of God, and who 
in their trials and sufferings carried to the extreme 
of human endurance, could bless the hand that 
" doeth all things well." 

Such were the Jansenists who, in adopting the 
Augustinian method of religious thought, including 
the Protestant doctrine of Justification by Faith, 
took a position which exposed them to misrepre- 
sentation and to the greatest trials. The great 



THE DIVINE PURPOSES. 



137 



names of Pascal, Arnauld and others among them, 
renowned alike for genius and piety, could not save 
them from fearful persecutions which have made 
their history memorable in the annals of human 
sorrow. 

Such were the Pilgrims and Puritans of New 
England, whose instructive history is repeated by 
their descendants, not only on account of its strange 
and romantic incidents and its great civil and polit- 
ical results, but as an illustration of the greatness 
of human strength when it rests believingly on the 
strength and purpose of an Almighty Arm. 

7. — It is true then, that God decides our destiny. 
And he does so, because all truth, all justice, and all 
good, look to him for the approbation of his wis- 
dom, and for the support of his strength. Either 
God rules or what is called fatality rules. But the 
Absolute Religion which is the highest declaration 
of philosophy, rejects the unsatisfactory dogma of 
fatalism, as a dishonor to truth and a crucifixion to 
humanity. But in rejecting fatalism, it does not 
reject the doctrine of the divine supremacy. Men 
cannot afford to part with the great Calvinistic idea 
which has become a part of human history; but 
they will do well to surround it with accessories 
which save it from exaggerations and which present 
it in the true light 



CHAPTER XIII. 

Universality of Religious Thought. 

I. — If there is a foundation for the doctrine of 
an Absolute Religion, then we shall find intimations 
and evidences of moral and religious thought in all 
lands ; and though separately considered they may 
bear the marks of imperfection and weakness, yet 
they will be found harmonizing in one general ten- 
dency, and contributing to one great result. Before 
the time of Moses there were men, — Enoch, Abra- 
ham and Noah may be mentioned as examples, — 
who were inwardly taught, and who communicated 
valuable religious truth to others. 

The respect and even reverential homage shown 
by Abraham to Melchisedek, in relation to whom 
it was said, he was without father or mother, in 
other words, without genealogical or historical rec- 
ord, may be regarded as incidentally revealing the 
fact of a religious character and position. The Ab- 
solute Religion, abstractly considered, has its foun- 
dation in the nature and relation of things ; but the 



UNIVERSALITY OF RELIGIOUS THOUGHT. 



139 



truths contained in it find their practical realization 
and their expression in the thoughts, lives, and 
history of individuals. Melchisedek was one of 
these persons. The Egyptians had a religious sys- 
tem. And it is not unreasonable to suppose that 
Moses may have received some important religious 
ideas from this remarkable people, among whom he 
was brought up and educated. The authorship of 
the first five books of the Bible is ascribed to Moses; 
but a careful examination of the first part of Genesis 
in the original Hebrew shows, in the view of many 
learned men, that he made use of and incorporated 
into his work certain historical documents written 
by other persons of an earlier date ; but who they 
were or to what land belonging, is now unknown. 

2. — The labors of the learned are greatly per- 
plexed in ascertaining who was Job, and to what 
land or people he belonged. But the intuitions of 
the readers of his wonderful poem can affirm boldly, 
in default of the records of personal history, that, 
though unknown and mysterious as Melchisedek, he 
was nevertheless a man of thought, of vast poetic 
imagination, and filled with inspirational teachings 
coming from above. In the latter days of the He- 
brew commonwealth, and greatly separated in cer- 
tain particulars of belief and practice from the great 
mass of the Jewish people, whole sects made their 



140 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

appearance, who may be described as seekers after 
divine knowledge and as truly inspirational. The 
history of the Essenes and Therapeutse, as it is given 
apparently from living and reliable sources, by Philo 
and Josephus, reveals facts of moral and religious in- 
sight and culture which are explainable only on the 
ground that the Living Principle of the universe, 
moved by the necessity involved in the universality 
of His great loving nature, has imparted to many 
solitary and praying hearts, whose religious position 
has not been generally recognized, some preparatory 
portions of the truths of the everlasting Gospel. 
At a still later period in history, in the Neo-PIatonic 
school of Alexandria, which pursued its investiga 
tions to a considerable extent outside of the pale ol 
Christianity, there are thoughts and aspirations, 
which remind one of the sublime meditations, and 
the deep spiritual experiences of the Almarics and 
Dinantos of the middle ages, with all the light and 
development they had received from the teachings 
of the New Testament. 

3. — It was in those ancient days and in periods 
exceedingly remote, and in another part of the 
world, that other teachers, under the blooming shade 
of Indian forests, and among them the mysterious 
Sakya-Mouni, made their appearance. Millions 
have been influenced by the teachings of this 



UNIVERSALIT Y OF RELIGIO US THO UGIIT. 1 4 1 

remarkable man. A prince, with all that wealth and 
political position could contribute to his personal 
happiness, and yet so deeply impressed with the 
wants and miseries of men, that he retired into the 
most solitary places, and aided by the preparation 
of many years of abstinence and prayer, came forth 
a humble and beneficent teacher of practical princi- 
ples, which the more enlightened piety of the present 
age is compelled to respect. And so, in like manner 
God had mercy on the Persians and the Chinese ; 
and in order that there might not be need of another 
deluge and of other fires of Sodom and Gomorrah, 
kindled the light of truth, feeble though it may have 
been, in the bosoms of Zoroaster and Confucius. 
The connection of the Persians with the Hebrews, 
which was in part owing to a harmony of religious 
thought, is a matter of great interest. The second 
Temple was built under Persian authority and with 
Persian aid. In Persia where the religious ideas in 
relation to God, approximated to those of the He- 
brews, the opinion was widely prevalent that a great 
religious teacher and deliverer was to come. And 
at the appointed period the " Wise Men" as they 
are called, who were probably persons belonging to 
the select and honored class of Persian Magi, came 
from that distant land to do homage to the child of 
Bethlehem. 



142 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

4. — If we look in other directions we find the 
same remarkable fact, that everywhere great moral 
and religious truths more or less clearly make their 
appearance. Of those who received something of 
this heavenly illumination among other peoples and 
in other times, is it too much to say that Homer, a 
great reality, although a man as much unknown as 
Melchisedek and Job, was reached by some scatter- 
ed rays. Let the man of deep moral intuition read 
the works of that prince of poets, particularly the 
Odyssey, not to settle points of geography or primi- 
tive history, but to learn the facts and methods of 
human action and the principles which lay at its 
foundation ; and he will meet with moral problems, 
and with moral and spiritual suggestions, the origin 
of which can find an explanation only in such views 
as have now been presented. It is said of Plato, 
that he visited Egypt and studied at Heliopolis ; 
and the remains of ancient art reveal to the aston- 
ished eye of the modern traveller, that the City ol 
the Sun may have had attractions even for such a 
mind as Plato's; but those who have deeply pon- 
dered the import of his writings, will be slow to 
believe that the teachings of Egyptian priests 
wholly superseded the higher and better teachings, 
which fall in mercy everywhere from the universal 
presence and the universal operation of the great 



UNI VERSA LITY OF RELIGIO US THO UGHT. \ 43 

Living Principle. And we may speak of Socrates, 
the light of Athens, whose scientific and moral doc- 
trines were illustrated by the genius of Plato ; the 
memory of whose sufferings and death for the truth, 
is not recalled even in these late days without the 
greatest sympathy and sorrow. The doctrine of the 
Grecian dramatists, particularly ^Eschylus, is, that 
evil deeds are followed by retribution ; and that 
Jupiter, whom they regarded as the highest ruling 
power in human affairs, distributes to every one 
according to the good or evil character which at- 
taches to his doing, — a reality so great, that its 
freedom can never be touched by arbitrary power, 
and w r hich holds in its own hand the height and 
the degradation of its measureless destiny. It 
may justly be asserted, that man with all his lia- 
bilities to a morally evil course, is worthy of a 
high degree of reverential respect, and is always 
an object of the deepest interest so long as he 
holds in his bosom the possibilities and seed of im- 
mortality. Whatever may be said of his actually 
sinning or of his liability to sin, it is still true 
that he is a child of God, born in the image of 
God. Nor is it inconsistent with this great truth 
that he was, is, and necessarily must be sub- 
jected to law. It cannot be otherwise. And espe- 
cially is he subjected to that wide-reaching and 



144 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

eternal law which God himself cannot modify or 
repeal without a violation of his own moral nature, 
that so far as he comes in contact with them, he 
must respect the position and practically and fully 
recognize the rights and claims of any and all be- 
ings and things in the universe. This law, which 
carries with it the sanctions of happiness or suffer- 
ing, resolves itself into another equally clear to our 
intuitional convictions, that inasmuch as it can be 
fulfilled only in one way, he must place himself in 
the keeping of the Infinite Mind ; and by a second 
and grander birth be bom, or if it be preferred, be 
intellectually and affectionally expanded out of the 
limitations and necessary imperfections of self-hood, 
so that seeing with God's eye and feeling with God's 
heart and acting in God's will, who is both the 
originating and the conservative force of the uni- 
verse, he can become the child of God in the higher 
and eternal sense. So that the new or second birth 
which changes man's centre from the one to the all, 
and from man to God, so far from being the oppro- 
brium of theology, is its culmination and its crown of 
honor. And if it is inconsistent with that mistaken 
and pretended philosophy, which makes man a ma- 
terialism and death an eternal sleep, is not incon- 
sistent with philosophy of a higher and diviner 
origin. 



UNIVERSALITY OF RELIGIOUS THOUGHT. 145 

5. — And again what controversies have existed, 
what mental battles have been fought, over the 
supposed and alleged contradictions of the Trinity. 
But the difficulty was, that humanity, struggling out 
of the depths of the sensuous and limited, had not 
reached that higher position, where it could recog- 
nize the mighty and world-renovating truth of the 
Motherhood of God. 

And if under the biblical name of Wisdom or the 
Word, hidden somewhat for wise purposes until the 
fulness of time, there is an eternal Motherhood as 
well as eternal Fatherhood, then it is no offence to 
the highest reason to assert, that there is and must 
be either actually or potentially, in posse or in esse, 
an eternal Son. And in that Sonship linked to the 
Infinite by a divine affiliation, happy will it be if we 
too, in the expansion and completion of the second 
Birth, shall find ourselves included. 

6. — Other things might be mentioned. The 
doctrine of salvation by faith for instance, on the 
basis that salvation in its essential nature is a mental 
state and not a locality, so far from being a preten- 
tious mystery and theological figment, has its foun- 
dation in well ascertained mental principles. Sal- 
vation in its true sense is impossible in any other 
way. And if -it be asked how it was possible that 
Christ and his unlettered followers, the most of 
7 



ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 



140 

whom had no especial advantages of education, be- 
came so richly gifted in philosophical verities, I 
answer that the philosophy of the human mind was 
first hidden in the Infinite Mind, and that the sim- 
plicity and truth of their hearts fitted them as noth- 
ing else can fit men, to become apt and successful 
disciples in the inward teachings of the eternal 
God. 



CHAPTER XIV. 

Harmony of Religious Opinions. 

I. — The Absolute Religion, so far as it can be es- 
tablished and accepted, necessarily tends to the har- 
mony of opinions. We do not forget, however, in 
view of the actually existing constitution of the hu- 
man mind, that absolute harmony of opinion on all 
subjects is an impossibility. Differences of opinion 
exist as the unavoidable result of differences in men- 
tal structure, and of the different positions and as- 
pects in which objects of inquiry are presented for 
consideration. And such differences, which have 
their foundation in the wisdom that regulates all 
things, are one of the sources of the activity and hap- 
piness of life. Nevertheless, when controverted sub- 
jects are examined beyond the region of facts to the 
region of principles, and Avhen principles are recog- 
nized by the highest reason, it may justly be antici- 
pated that harmony of views, in such cases and to 
such extent, will exist. 

2. — A controversy of long duration has existed 



I 4 8 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

in relation to man's character at the time of his birth. 
The controversy involves a variety of questions ; and 
particularly whether man at the time of his birth is 
a depraved or an innocent being ; and if his charac- 
ter be that of purity or innocence, in what way are 
we to explain the acknowledged fact of great moral 
evils existing in the world. If we have given a true 
exposition of the Absolute view, of which we must 
leave others to judge, we have seen how the various 
apparently contradictory views in relation to human 
depravity may be reconciled. And this certainly, 
when we remember how much time has been spent 
on the subject and how much bad feeling engender- 
ed, is a great gain. 

3. — And so in regard to the atonement, as it is 
theologically, and as it seems to me very properly, 
termed. Atonement in its etymological sense 
means reconciliation and union with God ; and phil- 
osophy declares, that this could not take place with- 
out the forgiveness of sin, as antecedent to the re- 
moval of that moral antagonism which necessarily 
exists between a sinning and a sinless being. It will 
perhaps be said, that the difficulty is not so much 
with the thing as with the way or manner in which 
it is accomplished, namely, by the shedding of the 
blood of Jesus. But when it is remembered, that 
the blood cannot be separated from the divine, liv- 



HARMONY OF RELIGIOUS OPINIONS. 



I49 



ing, and eternal principle which is the life of the 
blood, and without which the blood would not have 
efficacy, it can hardly fail to relieve thoughtful and 
conscientious minds. Many, encouraged by this in- 
terior and deeper but necessary view, have hastened 
to yield their hearts and lives to the mighty and re- 
generating influences of the great principle, — the 
principle which both creates and saves — that finds its 
manifestation in the Cross. And then it is to be re- 
membered further, that words in certain aspects of 
them are things, and often in their control over the 
human mind, are very powerful things. 

In the case of many persons the long use of cer- 
tain expressions in relation to the blood of Christ, 
(words which have a providential and wise relation 
to the first or sensuous development of man's nature,) 
make it very difficult for them after a time to make 
the distinction which has just now been referred to. 
Nevertheless, the ultimate philosophy requires the 
distinction to be made, and at the same time points 
out the relation and unites and harmonizes the two. 
And the Scriptures, when rightly interpreted and 
when searched to their foundations, are not antagon- 
istical, but harmonize, in this case as in all others, 
with a right philosophy. 

4. — Again, the doctrine of the first and second 
birth and their relation to each other, (a matter 



ISO 



ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 



which has caused much perplexity,) not only har- 
monizes with the statements of the Scriptures and 
with outward facts ; but considered, as it truly is, as 
a great mental and moral problem, vindicates its 
claims to the highest wisdom. It makes man, not 
a machine merely, moving no one knows how in the 
iron tracks of a dead materialism, but a grand and 
active reality in the universe, even in his first condi- 
tion of self-hood and of self-asserting independence. 

5. — Rome, too, had her teachers; Numa, the 
founder of institutions and laws ; Camillus who an- 
nounced the great truth, which Christianity has 
verified, " adversce res admonuerunt religionum;" 
Cato, who did right, " not to be seen to do it, but 
because he could not help doing it ; " Cicero, the 
eloquent and intuitional expounder of philosophical 
problems; Seneca, who resisted the corruptions of a 
degenerate age ; and among the long list of those 
who announced the truth and struggled against 
error, that wonderful bard of Mantua, whose beauti- 
ful and sublime utterances were, in some sense, the 
Gospel of his time and country. And all this is in 
accordance with what the Apostle Paul has said of 
the Gentiles, that they are a law unto themselves, 
and show the works of the law written in their 
hearts ; in other words, that God has made to all 
men everywhere an inward moral revelation. It is 



HARMONY OF RELIGIOUS OPINIONS. 



151 



not surprising, therefore, that Sir James Mackintosh, 
one of the eminent statesmen and philosophers of 
modern times, says, in a learned discourse on the 
Law of Nature and Nations, that "lawgivers and 
statesmen, but above all, moralists and political 
philosophers, may plainly discover, in all the useful 
and beautiful variety of governments and institu- 
tions, and under all the fantastic multitude of usages 
and rites which have prevailed among men, the 
same fundamental, comprehensive truths, the sacred 
master principles, which are the guardians of human 
society, recognized and revered, with few and slight 
exceptions, by every nation upon earth." A view 
which was anticipated, and which is sustained by a 
multitude of facts and quotations, in the profound 
volumes of Montesquieu and Grotius. 

6. — It is thus we remember, with deep gratitude, 
what God has done for the nations in the earliest 
times; how He has borne with their sins, and has 
always given them that kind and degree of instruc- 
tion which was best suited to their situation. No 
nation ever has been, or ever can be wholly forgot - 
ten. The God of the Hebrews, although in some 
respects with less intimate relations, was neverthe- 
less the God of Greece and Rome. And history 
abundantly shows, that the historical development 
of those remarkable nations, including literature as 



1 5 2 ABSOL UTE RELIGION. 

well as arms, and art as well as power, was precisely 
adjusted, in time and circumstances, to the Hebrew 
development. And when. in the fulness of time the 
Star of Bethlehem arose, which otherwise would 
have shone only over the waters of Galilee and the 
hills of Judea, it became the guiding light and the 
illumination of the world, through the aiding influ- 
ences of Greek and Roman civilization. 

7. — This subject, of which we have thus given a 
short and imperfect outline, is well worthy of the 
attention of the Christian scholar. It is a subject 
which can never be thoroughly mastered, except by 
those who combine the learning of human schools 
with a religious nature and deep religious experi- 
ence. Learning, religion and philosophy must go 
hand in hand in its development. It may require 
the destruction or the re-adjustment of nations ; but 
Christ as God incarnate in the great principles which 
he taught and illustrated, and which are recognized 
and affirmed by the highest reason, will at last as- 
cend the height of his position and exercise his uni- 
versal dominion. 

President Edwards, in his truly great work on 
the History of Redemption, is right in giving us to 
understand that God, as the living principle of the 
ages, and especially in the great fact of his Incarna- 
tion, is the key-note to the philosophy of history, 



HARMONY OF RELIGIOUS OPINIONS. 



153 



God's life knows no cessation of activity ; and his 
wisdom and benevolence will always turn that activ- 
ity in the right direction. The car of the universe 
is not floating at random ; but under the Master's 
hand is always tending to one great issue. 

7* 



CHAPTER XV. 

Optimism. 

I. — God rules. God is good. And He rules in 
such a way that goodness can never be excluded. 
In the end when events are connected both with 
causes and results, all will be found for the best. 
And this, expressed in few and simple terms, is what 
is known historically as Optimism, — a doctrine 
which not only has its foundation in the Absolute 
Truth, but which is practically of so much impor- 
tance that it is well entitled to careful considera- 
tion. 

2. — The subject may be argued and illustrated 
from various points of view. It may be said per- 
haps by some in a simple sentence, that if God is 
supreme, and if at the same time his existence is 
characterized by perfect goodness, the optimistic 
result, which is identical with the greatest possible 
good, necessarily follows. There cannot possibly 
be any other. All things are and must be for the 
best. This is a short argument, it is true, but it is 



OPTIMISM. 



155 



of a nature to excite thought and perhaps to carry 
weight and conviction. During a long life I have 
not been exempt from the trials which are the com- 
mon allotment of men ; but I became early a disci- 
ple in the optimistic school; and the bitter tears I 
have sometimes shed have not prevented me from 
saying most heartily and sincerely, all is well. And 
I hope it will not be considered thoughtless or pre- 
sumptuous to add, that those who are not able to 
say this, and in whom the words do not express an 
inwrought personal conviction, have yet something 
of great practical value to learn. 

In saying that all is for the best, it is well to 
consider a moment how much is included in it. All 
truth, all falsehood, all joy, all sorrow, all kindness, 
all enmity, all reward, all punishment, all glory, all 
shame, and whatever else enters in to make up the 
moral constitution of the universe, when properly 
understood in its principle and its results, and when 
properly adjusted each to the other, contributes in 
one way or another to the universal harmony, and 
could not be left out without a loss to the universal 
and highest happiness. And when this great an- 
nouncement is fully and sincerely received on scrip- 
tural and philosophical principles, as the teaching 
alike of the uttered scriptural Word and of the Ab- 
solute psychical reason, then the heart and the head, 



156 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

both in their fears of danger and their experiences 
of grief, find a pillow on which they can rest secure- 
ly and rest forever. 

3. — It will be asked is sin for the best? In an- 
swering this question we are first required to answer 
another which naturally precedes it, namely, — What 
is the best constitution of the universe ? Is it one 
which excludes the possibility of all moral and re- 
sponsible life, or one which admits and requires 
such moral responsibility ? If in answering this 
question, we accept the great fact of a moral and 
responsible nature with all that is naturally involved 
in it, we necessarily accept wrong or crime or sin as 
a possibility, and may reasonably expect that it will 
sometime have an existence. The analysis of the 
operations of the human mind shows, that the idea 
of right implies and necessitates that of wrong ; that 
the idea of virtue in like manner implies and neces- 
sitates that of vice ; so that it can always be said of 
the man who does right, that he might have done 
wrong ; and of the man who treads the path of vir- 
tue, that it was possible for him to have gone in the 
opposite direction. And therefore, if the existence 
of right implies the possible existence of wrong, if 
there can be no virtue without the possibility of its 
opposite, if the extinction of crime in the sense of 
its being an impossible thing involves the destruc- 



OPTIMISM. 



157 



tion of all moral good, then I think we cannot hesi- 
tate in saying, that those various evils which go 
under the name of wrong, crime, vice, and the like, 
taking into view their indirect relations and results, 
must be accepted as parts of the universal plan and 
are all for the best. So that sin itself, hateful as it 
is, may be regarded in the light of a true philosophy 
as a necessary result of the moral universe, and as 
throwing light upon the character of God. What 
idea should we have of the holiness of God, himself, 
if sin were an impossibility and therefore a thing 
unknowable ; and if we could not aid our concep- 
tions by saying not merely that God is holy, but 
that in being holy He hates sin ? 

4. — And looking at the matter in another aspect, 
we must not forget, that man considered in relation 
to certain ends which are before him and as reach- 
ing upward to such ends, is a developing or pro- 
gressive, and not a fixed and stationary being. 
And it is generally conceded that all progress, in 
reaching its highest results, involves the fact of 
exercise, practice, struggles, obstacles to be met, 
and obstacles to be vanquished. Such are the laws 
of being, that growth and inactivity are incompati- 
ble ideas. It is involved in the mere fact of living 



&> 



that we must do battle in the great contest of life. 



t> j 



Christ himself assures us, that in the world we shall 



158 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

have tribulation, and the Apostle Paul exhorts us to 
fight the good fight of faith. But if moral evil is 
excluded from the universe, then all such views are 
out of place, and have no meaning. There is no 
contest, because there is nothing to contend with ; 
and there is no growth, because there is none of 
that spiritual wrestling, without which growth is un- 
known. And therefore we say again, that Optimism 
has a philosophical as well as scriptural foundation, 
and that in the conflicts and trials of life, including 
moral evils and moral conflicts, all is for the best. 

5. — But supposing, says one, that moral evil, in 
the contest which its existence necessarily implies, 
should gain the victory, what is our situation then ; 
and what becomes of the optimistic utterance. 
And here it may be said, if we take the question in 
the widest sense, that it involves what may be called 
an impossible supposition. It is the affirmation of 
all thought and all philosophy, the doctrine of all 
the suggested or inspirational Scriptures of all ages 
and all nations, the dying word of those who drink 
hemlock, and perish in the flames, and bleed upon 
the cross, the martyred teachers and guides of hu- 
manity, that goodness taken in its widest sense, 
bears in its bosom the seed of immortality and can 
never be overthrown ; that it conquers now, and 



OP TIM ISM. 



J 59 



conquers forever. Let that word stand ; humanity 
will never part with it. 

6. — But when we look at the contest, not in its 
general aspect, but as we find it commenced and 
progressing in individual cases, we must confess that 
the battle sometimes goes against us. But we are 
at liberty to add that it does so for a good reason ; 
that it does so because we violate the laws of victory, 
and therefore we can still hold to the great truth we 
are considering. And the reason to which we refer 
is the fact, never to be forgotten, that God is a real- 
ity and holds a position which can never be set 
aside. Not an impersonal God, who is rhetorically 
great but practically nothing. Not a fatalistic God 
— a God who is bound in chains and fetters ; nor an 
heathen idol God, who has as little intelligence and 
power as the wood and stone of which he is fash- 
ioned ; but a God, who clothes his infinitude with a 
personal oversight and responsibility, who takes an 
interest in all the things He has made and especially 
in his own children, whom He is fashioning by the 
process of trial into the perfection and brightness of 
his own image. He has all strength, and He is al- 
ways ready to render all needed assistance. But 
while standing at our side and always ready with 
his aid, He will not and cannot violate and des 
troy our position as his intelligent and responsible 



l6o ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

children, by violating our moral freedom. If we re- 
ject his aid it necessarily follows that in some cases, 
and I think in all, sin will have dominion over us ; 
but on the other hand if we accept it and trust in it, 
though our strength may be small, we never fail to 
conquer. And in either case, whether we rise with 
God or fall without Him, when we look carefully at 
the principles involved, we can still say, it is all for 
the best. 

And thus it is that in these and all other things 
the Absolute Religion, in aid of Revealed Religion, 
stands ready, by processes of intelligent thought and 
reason, to show that all the constituents of the 
moral universe, when all facts, relations and issues 
are reached, hold their position, not as an error or 
an accident, but as the out-giving of the highest 
wisdom, and as necessary elements in a system 
which is stamped with perfection. 

7. — But the question is sometimes asked, wheth- 
er this view does not make God the author of 
sin ; in other words, whether all moral evils of 
whatever nature may not be laid directly and ex- 
clusively to his account ? The fact supposed to be 
involved in such inquiries, is as far as possible from 
the truth. It is true that God cannot establish a 
moral universe in which the highest and most glori- 
ous results may be realized without admitting the 



OPTIMISM. j6i 

possibility of sin. But it is also true, both on philo- 
sophic and scriptural principles, and also as shown 
by the history of his dealings with the world, that 
God takes all possible measures short of a violation 
of man's freedom, which cannot be violated without 
man's ceasing to be a man, to instruct man, to pro- 
tect him against evils and to guide him to truth and 
to good. So far from being the author of sin, God 
shows himself both by his nature and his works to 
be the enemy of sin; and also looking at the subject 
in another aspect, that he is the friend of all good 
or holiness, and the assertion that God is the au- 
thor of sin in the sense in which the suggestion is 
evidently made, is not only an error but a wrong, a 
contempt of the highest goodness as well as a dis- 
honor to unchangeable truth. 

8. — The greatest of all moral teachers and phil- 
osophers, I mean Christ himself, in a few wonderful 
words, has announced the great truth which forms 
the subject of this chapter. " It must needs be" he 
says, " that offences come ; but woe unto that man 
by whom the offence cometh." In other words, the 
principles of the moral universe, being a " needs be" 
are necessities. They exist, not by an arbitrary 
command which would be consistent with the idea 
that there was a time when they had no existence, 
but because the " needs be " was in them; and exist 



1 62 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

therefore beyond time and beyond space, and with 
eternity for their changeless home. There is no 
wisdom back of them or above them which can orig- 
inate or alter and improve, or make them in any 
way otherwise than they are. And yet it is further 
implied in this remarkable passage, that these ne- 
cessities by which sin comes into the world, in point 
of fact and in the view of those who have a true 
interior insight, will be found consistent with per- 
sonal responsibility and with the punishment of evil- 
doers. 

Nevertheless we are willing to admit that on 
this great subject there may be and there probably 
are difficulties which a finite mind cannot easily 
solve. And to a mind that is in a right position, 
this admission excites no surprise and causes no 
sorrow, because it is one of those things which God 
himself cannot remedy, unless He can unite things 
which are contradictory and incompatible in their 
nature, and make the finite identical with the Infi- 
nite. 



CHAPTER XVI. 

The Objective and Subjective in Religion. 

I. — It is sometimes thought that the Objective or 
outward in religion, and the Subjective or inward, 
are not only antagonistical, but are mutually exclu- 
sive and destructive of each other. This I suppose 
to be a mistake. They are neither destructive of 
each other, nor are they necessarily antagonistical ; 
but on the contrary, are essentially harmonious, al- 
though it may sometimes be true, in consequence 
of diversity of relations, that they are antagonistical 
in appearance. 

The question of the Objective and the Sub- 
jective in religion, is prominently and specifically the 
question, stated in simpler terms, is God without us 
or within us ? Our answer is, that God is every 
where ; but not in the same sense, nor with the 
same efficacy, nor with the same results. And these 
differences depend not merely upon the facts of the 
divine nature, but partly upon other related facts, 
incidents and experiences. Accordingly it may be 



164 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

said as a truth, that irreligion necessitates objectiv- 
ity ; because, from the very fact of being what it is, 
it closes the heart and excludes the divine entrance. 
The irreligious or Adamic man, or man under the 
influence of inordinate self-hood, and with the spir- 
itual eye almost closed with the Adamic incrusta- 
tions, can see only the objective or outward God. 
But under the more favorable influences of Christi- 
anity and with a wider and truer vision for which he 
ought to be grateful, he sees Him under a human 
form, elevated to the position of a throne and sway- 
ing a sceptre. But He sits there nevertheless, what- 
ever the degree of his elevation or glory, as an ob- 
jective or outward God. But God as thus present- 
ed, is not to be regarded as wanting in reality ; nor 
as a reality not accordant with the facts of a sound 
philosophy. The true God is universal ; but the 
Adamic eye, or the eye which sees only from the 
stand-point of its own personal interests, can see God 
only under the law of its own perceptivity ; and lo- 
cates Him and circumscribes Him with the limita- 
tions, which are reflected from its own nature. And 
thus it is that the sinner sees God outwardly, be- 
cause the fact of sinfulness is a decree of banishment, 
and it is a logical sequence of such a sight, that he 
not only sees, but fears and trembles. 

2. — It should be remembered however, that God 



OBJECTIVE AND SUBJECTIVE IN RELIGION. 165 

objective is not a different God, but differently seen ; 
not located and limited in his distant place by his 
essential nature, but because He will not enter the 
selfish heart ; and the selfish heart, therefore, can 
only see Him in the distance. But it is better, far 
better, that He should thus be seen, than not seen 
at all. It is the beginning of a new thought ; it is 
the incipiency of searching and often terrible convic- 
tions ; it is the opening and revelation in the soul of 
that which makes an unbelieving Felix tremble. 

3. — Such is the God of the sinner, a God true to 
the relations under which the sinner sees him ; seen 
at a distance, because He is distant ; seen in exclu- 
sion, because He zj excluded ; seen in anger, because 
it is right and just that He should be angry. But 
under the appliances of new truths and such influ- 
ences as God can exercise consistently with the sin- 
ner's freedom, and especially in connection with his 
mediatorial manifestations, He begins to present 
himself in accordance with the sinner's altered men- 
tal position and wants, in the attributes of forgive- 
ness, mercy and love. He expands to the mental 
vision just in proportion as the mental vision en- 
larges itself to perceive. And in this expansion by 
the laws of spiritual insight, He comes nearer and 
nearer, till at last instead of being excluded and 
kept at a distance, He begins to enter and take up 



I 66 ABSOL UTE RELIGION. 

his abode in the soul itself, and to find his locality, 
not as a God afar off, but as a real dweller in the 
sacred and spiritual home of holy thoughts and holy 
dispositions. It is in harmony with the doctrine of 
these statements, that the late Dr. Payson, of Maine, 
in speaking of his personal experience, says, " the 
Sun of Righteousness has been gradually drawing 
nearer and nearer, appearing larger and brighter as 
He approached.'' And when God has thus changed 
his position from God outward in the heavens to 
God inward in the Spirit, we have a rational and to 
some extent satisfactory explanation of the expres- 
sion ' God subjective ' / — in other words, a God inte- 
rior, a God in psychical possession, a God dwelling 
in the soul. 

There is therefore, a foundation for the terms 
Objective and Subjective in religion, although they 
sound somewhat crude and inharmonious to an 
Anglo-Saxon, ear ; and they are terms which have a 
real and substantial significancy ; word-symbols of 
great and essential religious facts, though not facts 
which are realized at the same period in the mind's 
history ; and which are harmonized with each other 
by the adjustment of additional facts and additional 
relations. 

4. — There is an incidental topic which seems to 
merit a brief notice. The statement is found in 



OBJECTIVE AND SUBJECTIVE IN RELIGION. 167 

certain philosophical speculations, though some- 
times appearing merely in the form of a suggestion, 
that the subjective experience, when carried to its 
highest results, requires and necessitates the " iden- 
tification of the subject and object, of the worship- 
per and the worshipped ; " in other words, that 
man in becoming sanctified, or as it is sometimes 
expressed "divinized" through the presence and 
reigning power of the Holy Ghost, ceases to be 
man. But this view, which would readily be ac- 
cepted in the doctrines of Pantheism, has the as- 
pect, to say the least, of being a hasty and erroneous 
generalization ; leading to injurious and fatal results. 
It is the confounding of identity of nature with 
identity of forms, attributes and relations. The 
sunbeam is not the same with the sun ; the drop of 
water is not the same with the ocean ; the morning 
zephyr is not the same thing with the wild, sweep- 
ing whirlwind. Everywhere, in all the realms of 
nature, we find the same essentiality' of nature, com- 
bined with differences of manifestation and relations, 
which divide that essential oneness, that divinely 
central and inseparable brotherhood, into distinct 
and beautiful and permanent individualisms. Paul 
did not cease to be Paul, because he asserted and 
asserted truly, that Christ lived in him. The pos- 
session of a divine nature, which is the duty and the 



1 68 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

privilege of every one, does not make him a Deity ; 
which, notwithstanding the ingenious speculations 
of the ancient Hindoos, or of the Neo-Platonic 
Alexandrine schools, or of their more modern fol- 
lowers, seems to the truly Christian mind, not only 
adverse to the Scriptures, but both a philosophical 
and physical impossibility. Let it be understood 
and remembered, that diversity of life is as much a 
truth of the universe as essentiality of life ; and 
angels, and all holy beings who may reach that high 
stature and glory of existence, will be angels still. 
Absorption into God, as a permanent and universal 
result, would be the cessation and death of God 
himself; whose very element and essentiality of life, 
is its tendency to out-flowing and manifested com- 
munication. 



CHAPTER XVII. 

Unities and Diversities, 

I. — It is not to be supposed, that all diversities 
are disunities. On the contrary, unity in diversity, 
a central and life-giving principle with variations in 
manifestation, is a great philosophical announce- 
ment ; and justly regarded as one among the most 
interesting which have been propounded for con- 
sideration. There are many rivers, but they flow to 
one ocean ; many planets, but one central sun ; 
many nerves, but having their source in the central 
brain ; many pulsations, but they come from one 
heart. Everywhere, but oftentimes with compara- 
tive subordinations and in separate cycles of exist- 
ence and movement, we find this great fact of a 
central unity, with its out-going but correlated di- 
versities. Writers on aesthetics, for instance, teach 
us, that amid all the varieties of outward form and 
beauty, which manifest themselves in the different 
schools of architecture and painting, there are cer- 
tain common principles which underlie them all ; 
8 



i;o 



ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 



and which secures in different and distant ages and 
countries, the permanency of their power over the 
human mind. Applying the great principle before 
us to our moral and religious nature, and with the 
object of briefly noticing its connection with a living 
Christianity, and also some of its bearings on na- 
tions, we proceed now to remark, that there may be 
diversities which characterize the intellectual action, 
and which attach especially to that part of the 
mind ; but which, nevertheless, will be found to 
be consistent with a high degree of unity in the 
more interior and affectional nature. In other 
words, there may be differences and conflicts of the 
intellect combined with unity of the heart. 

2. — The statement just made seems to us to 
be justified by a correct knowledge of our mental 
constitution. It is generally conceded, that our - 
comparative views or knowledge of things, are deter- 
mined in part by the comparative strength of our 
intellectual powers ; and in part also by the stand 
point or intellectual position, in which we happen 
to be when those powers are exercised. In regard 
to most objects of knowledge, especially objects of 
outward knowledge, it is well understood that every 
one, saying nothing of the amount or specific char- 
acter of his perceptive power, holds a position differ- 
ent in some respects from every other person ; and 



UNITIES AND DIVERSITIES. 



171 



that this circumstance alone, without taking the 
interior causes of differences into account, must 
necessarily lay the foundation of very different re- 
sults. If two men, for instance, placed in quite 
different positions, are looking at a building of va- 
ried architectural proportions and beauty, it is 
found impossible for them, even if they have the 
same powers of perception, to take the same view. 
To each of the two, the view which he takes is a 
true one, considered relatively to the extent of his 
own faculties and the position from which he exer- 
cises them ; but it is more or less different from 
that of the other. Such is the intellectual law in 
the case. 

3. — Upon this general basis of the laws of knowl- 
edge, without going into more specific statements 
and limitations, which a full discussion might call 
for, we propose to make a few practical remarks. 
And the first is, that there is a philosophical as well 
as a Scriptural foundation for the great idea, which 
awaits a wider development than it has hitherto 
known of Christian unity. It is important to us as 
Christians, aiming at the highest results of Chris- 
tianity, to understand and remember, that the prin- 
ciple, which applies in so many other cases, has a 
specific application to ourselves ; and that intellect- 
ual differences, in being to some extent a necessity, 



172 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

do not and cannot in themselves considered, and to 
the extent at least of their necessary existence, fur- 
nish a justifiable obstacle to love. Indeed, looking 
at the matter philosophically, have we not some rea- 
son for saying that differences are the foundation 
of love ? If we were all formed alike, and looked 
alike and were alike in all other respects, the many 
would be merged in one ; everything would be iden- 
tical ; and the fact of loving would cease because 
there would be no opportunity of loving. But with- 
out pressing this point, let us remember that God, 
in the most true and important sense, loves all be- 
ings and seeks the good of all, notwithstanding the 
amazing diversities which exist. And if God thus 
throws the arms of his affections around those, who 
are constituted with intellectual differences and who, 
by the necessities of their position, exercise these 
differences in different ways and with different re- 
sults, then those, who are born into the true and 
full life of God, and who love as God loves, may be 
expected to have power to surmount these differen- 
ces also, and to harmonize the conflicts and antag- 
onisms of thought by means of the more interior 
unities of affection. And hence it is, that the Apos- 
tle Paul, in connection with that unity of heart 
which binds the soul to Christ and which consolidates 
the great Christian brotherhood into the same unity 



UNITIES AND DIVERSITIES. 



173 



of life, argues with a sublimity of thought as sound 
in philosophy as it is true in religion, that the out- 
ward distinctions of bond and free, of Greek and Jew, 
of male and female, of circumcision and uncircum- 
cision, of Barbarian and Scythian, all involving more 
or less the intellectual and incidental differences of 
thought and culture and practical life, are merged 
and lost sight of in that grand and essential unity. 
Gal. iii : 28. Coloss. iii : 11. And hence it happened, 
after the great day of Pentecost, that Parthians and 
Medes and Elamites and Phrygians and Egyptians 
and Lybians and Cretans and Arabians, all uttering 
the discordancies of different languages, and all 
modified intellectually by great differences of thought, 
and by the training of their different situations, were 
nevertheless in their more interior nature baptized 
into one spirit. 

And hence it happens also, as we learn from 
time to time, that modern missionaries in heathen 
lands, meeting together in the presence of great 
necessities which swell within them the tide of the 
soul's Essential Life, find its increasing waves of 
holy love mounting upward and upward, and thus 
overflowing and sweeping away the divisive im- 
pulses of the intellect and the conventional lines of 
sectarian separation. 

4. — Again, the doctrine of unity in diversity, 



174 



ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 



when understood in the principles which lie at its 
foundation, helps us in the matter of forgiveness 
and of love to our enemies. When persons are 
pressed on the subject of an inward holy life, and 
the example of the Elder Brother is set before them 
as an example to be followed in all respects, they 
frequently stumble at the requisition to love their 
enemies, and to do good to those who have done 
injury to themselves. But let them do what they 
ought to do, and be at once what Christ would have 
them to be ; and they will not fail to see the truth 
and beauty of this great command. If, under the 
influences of the living truth, they boldly and fully 
follow Christ in the inward regeneration, it may 
always be said that their enemies smite them be- 
cause they do not understand them. In other 
words, acting from the sphere of the intellect, and 
beholding things from the lower plane which con- 
stitutes their stand-point, they aim their blows at 
the creations of their own imagination. In their 
darkened vision, perverted by their own selfishness, 
or by the discordancies of a necessitated position, 
they mistake ministering angels who come with 
messages of love, for powers and principalities of 
evil who threaten them with harm. The Roman 
soldiers who thrust their spears at the " man of 
sorrows," did not know the truth and purity and 



UNITIES AND DIVERSITIES. 175 

benevolence of Him whose blood they sought. 
And hence his glorious nature was both prompted 
by benevolence, and, in recognizing the laws of 
man's mental constitution, harmonized with the 
philosophical truth of things, loyal alike and un- 
changeable to the justice of truth and the divinity 
of goodness, when He uttered that memorable say- 
ing : " Father, forgive them, for they know not what 
they do? 

5. — And we may remark further, looking at the 
subject in its political and national relations, that we 
find in the principles which have been laid down, 
a philosophical foundation for the great political 
doctrine so lor\g and warmly contested, of a tolera- 
tion of opinions, considered as a political atid constitu- 
tional right. The human mind, if we have been 
correct in our positions, is so constituted and so 
situated in the circumstances of its action, that oft> 
entimes it necessarily takes different views. If it so 
happens, therefore, at any time and under any cir- 
cumstances, that we cannot make our neighbors 
understand things as we understand them, either 
through our incapacity to communicate or their 
incapacity to receive, we must calmly bear with it. 
They are not, on the ground of such incapacity, to 
be the subjects of sneers, of sarcasm, of unfeeling 
rebuke, of imprisonments, of tortures, of social os- 



iy6 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

tracism, or of anything inconsistent with the for- 
bearance and charity which such a state of things 
obviously requires. When men, therefore, fought 
for the toleration of religious opinions in the Eng- 
lish Revolution of 1640 and in the American Revo- 
lution of 1776, and in other memorable historical 
periods, they fought for a great necessity of their 
nature. And accordingly it is well to understand 
and practically insist, that this great principle of 
toleration is not merely a truth of the sword which 
bloody battles have established, and which other 
battles might unsettle and abrogate; but a truth 
of the highest reason, and of perpetual obligation. 

6. — And again, the principle under consideration 
has a connection with what has been called by a 
modern but expressive term, the " solidarity' of na- 
tions. Whatever diversities may exist among na- 
tions politically or otherwise, the law of the universe 
which philosophers have denominated. Unity in Di- 
versity, which lies back of all diversities, and which 
in this particular case touches nations, because it 
touches individuals, requires that they must march in 
harmony with the unifying centre. Diversified as 
they may be by monarchies or senates, or by other 
civil and political variations, all nations have a " soli- 
darity " or community of life, because a nation is a 
unified or consolidated man, and because all men who 



UNITIES AND DIVERSITIES. iyy 

go to make the national or consolidated existence, 
are born alike in the image of God; and not only 
have certain inalienable rights, as Jefferson's great 
declaration has affirmed, but are the subjects of in- 
alienable obligations^ and are bound together by inalien- 
able ties. When the Roman audience loudly ap- 
plauded the great sentiment, " Homo sum ; humani 
nihil a me alienum puto" their hearts vibrated to the 
pulsations of that common life, which under all its 
separations makes humanity one. Such is the foun- 
dation of the great law of solidarity, which, while it 
recognizes diversities, subordinates them to itself as 
the great central principle. It is under the prompt- 
ings and influence of this beneficent principle, that 
nations, as if by a common impulse, are struggling to 
realize a community of interests in all cases where it 
is possible, and by all means which render it possible ; 
such as a common system of weights and measures, a 
common coinage, a common postal system, the ocean 
telegraph, the removal of the passport system, the 
extinction of what remains of feudalism, the recog- 
nition of the rights of different races notwithstand- 
ing the diversities of color, the expansion of 
nationalities in harmony with the aspirations of a 
common name and history, the extension of the 
ballot, the revision of the doctrines of naturaliza- 
tion, international exhibitions of the arts, the settle- 



178 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

ment of national difficulties by means of Congresses 
of nations, the introduction of the principle of Arbi- 
tration into treaties, together with the hope ulti- 
mately, of a permanent international Congress and 
a Court of nations, and also of a universal language. 



CHAPTER XVIII. 

View of the Doctrine of Sacrifices, 

The doctrine of the ancient Sacrifices reveals to 
us one of the forms in which God contends against 
satan, in which the life of good strives against the 
life of evil. God's great redemption plan has been 
to restore men from the life of self, in which they 
were destroying themselves to the universal brother- 
hood. In their inordinate self-hood they seized 
everything they could lay their hands upon, and 
held it all with the firmest possible grasp ; the fruits 
of the earth, the herds of the fields, doves, oxen, 
sheep, goats, camels. And they held everything 
they could thus get, not for the good of the object, 
but for their own good — not to communicate but to 
appropriate it. They made everything a sacrifice, a 
holocaust, a great burnt offering to their own lusts. 
With a view to break in upon the principality and 
dominion of selfishness, God commanded them, in the 
destruction which they made and were determined 
to make of all fruits and animals, that they should 



I gO ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

not appropriate everything to themselves, but offer 
a part to God. On God's part it was merely a form 
of proceeding. Under the form of an offering to 
God, it was really an offering for their own good. 

In this way they made a beginning in that great 
lesson, which all must learn if they would be saved. 
They were taught, that this partial sacrifice was the 
antetype or forerunner of something which was to 
come. They were yet to learn the nature of a true 
sacrifice — its extent, its possibility, its necessity. In 
its full extent, a true sacrifice is not the giving up 
of a part or the withholding of a part, but the sacri- 
fice of all. 

This is a thing possible to be done, otherwise it 
would not be required to be done. Luke 14 : 26. 
God incarnated himself as man, in order that he 
might illustrate in a way which all could understand, 
the nature, the extent, and the possibility of that 
sacrifice, which it is necessary for man to make in 
order to become a holy man. 

The true Christ sacrifice is a perpetual sacrifice. 
It is a law which proceeds from God, that the higher 
or more advanced existences give up themselves to 
the service and good of others who are lower. The 
death of Christ on the cross for the good of men was 
not merely an isolated fact, but the announcement 
and the verification of an universal and permanent 



VIEW OF THE DOCTRINE OF SACRIFICES. igl 

principle. And this principle is, that the Christ- 
sacrifice, which is holy love in its essential and celes- 
tial uses, never ceases ; and that redemption never 
ends. 

The divine brotherhood and sisterhood of Christ 
scattered up and down in the earth, and who in these 
last days are being gathered together out of all 
tongues and tribes and kindreds of men, and out of 
all separate forms and beliefs, still suffer to some ex- 
tent in the garden of Gethsemane or upon the Cross. 
The inheritors of Christ's nature, it is a matter of 
course that they are and must be, the inheritors of 
Christ's sufferings, so far as they come in contact 
with evil, and so far as in the prosecution of this 
conflict, they are called upon to labor and endure. 
The Apostle Paul, in speaking of himself, uses these 
expressions, " Who now rejoice in my sufferings for 
you, and fill up that which is behind of the suffer- 
ings of Christ in my flesh for his body's sake which 
is the church." Coloss. I : 24. The Apostle Peter, in 
his first general Epistle, calls upon the followers of 
Christ to " rejoice, inasmuch as they are partakers 
of Christ's sufferings." 

The Christ-spirit is always antagonistic to the 
unprogressive and selfish spirit, and therefore always 
labors, always endures, always suffers, yet always re- 
joices, always triumphs. Its triumph is an eternal 



1 82 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

triumph, because holy love is infinite in its resources, 
and selfishness is not ; — at the same time it must be 
said, that the contest in which it is engaged is a 
never-ending contest ; because in a moral universe, 
which is also necessarily a free universe, the series of 
the second or perfected births, in which the imperfect 
and evil give place to the good and perfect, consid- 
ered as a part of the divine order, and as a necessary 
step in progressional development, is as much a per- 
manent fact and truth as the truth of the divine ex- 
istence. 

When we reach the true interior sense of the 
Scriptures, we get at true unchangeable principles. 
Christ saves us by his blood ; his blood is his life, 
and he who gives up his life gives all. And it is 
thus that we can understand the doctrine of grace, 
in distinction from the doctrine of merit by works. 
We are saved by Christ, in other words we are saved 
by grace or love, which is Christ's positive or essen- 
tial nature, and this not of ourselves, it is the gift 
of God. The merit is in Love — and not in ourselves. 
But the question still remains, — how did Christ's 
sacrifice save sinners ? The common answer is, that 
he magnified the law and made it honorable. And 
what is the law ? In general and somewhat abstract 
terms it is, that we shall love God with all our 
heart ; and our neighbor as ourselves. In other 



VIEW OF THE DOCTRINE OF SACRIFICES. 183 

words we are to do good ; the higher are to watch 
over the lower ; the strong are to sustain the weak ; 
those who have knowledge are to enlighten the ig- 
norant ; we must and shall bestow upon others in 
proportion as we receive. This was the law which 
Christ divinely illustrated and magnified. He not 
only announced the law as Moses had done before ; 
but more than Moses did, he fulfilled it. He gave 
up his life from an earnest and sincere desire to do 
good to all because he himself was Love. Truly the 
great Law of Love was honored. 

9. — The universe, so far as it exhibits itself in 
the personalities and forms of things, in distinction 
from the Esse or essential being of things, is not a 
completion but a development; — an infinite pro- 
gression. It goes on continually from one step or 
plane of advancement to another. If it should stop 
in its progress it would necessarily fall into extinc- 
tion. In ceasing to progress, it would become lim- 
ited ; it would have a boundary of existence ; it 
would no longer be exhaustless in its resources ; and 
therefore, as it would be a necessity that its life 
would feed upon itself, it would rapidly waste its 
possessions. Progress, therefore, continued progress 
may be regarded as a necessity. To stand still is to 
perish. 

10. — And further it seems to be evident and is 



1 84 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

generally conceded, that progress involves the idea 
both of successions in time and of successions in de- 
gree ; one thing going before and another coming 
after ; one being below and another, which is the 
antecedent in time, being higher, sphere above 
sphere, and these spheres again having their distinct 
higher and lower circles or mansions ; human na- 
tures, spiritual or angelic natures, seraphic or super- 
angelic natures ; existences of names unknown with 
their appropriate surroundings, progressively and 
endlessly developing in the direction of the Infinite, 
and yet never reaching and never becoming identical 
with the Infinite. 



CHAPTER XIX. 

Growth of the Idea of God. 

I. — It is difficult to exaggerate the importance 
which is to be attached to a correct idea of God, 
considered as the embodiment and the personality 
of the essential living element. If our views on 
other points should be found to be correct but 
should prove incorrect here, the error would be 
likely to vitiate and weaken everything else. 

2. — And the reason is, that men will almost nec- 
essarily fashion themselves, in their principles and 
in their practice, into the image of God, as that im- 
age exists in their minds. Accordingly in adopting 
a false conception of God, if they thus substitute to 
themselves as an object of love and imitation, an 
unholy or satanic being instead of the true God, it 
will be found, that in their highest aspirations and 
efforts, they will only aim and labor to make them- 
selves evil and satanic, instead of aspiring to a truly 
holy or divine nature. If for instance, the God of a 
people is Moloch, — a conception of God which 



1 86 ABSOL UTE RELIGION. 

authorizes and requires extreme cruelty — it will be 
found that the people, assimilating themselves to 
their conception of what is divine, will adopt and 
perpetuate the infamous cruelties, whatever they 
may be which their god approves. 

The account of systems of worship, and of the 
various and numerous gods, which men have adored 
in various ages of the world and in different places, 
constitute a deeply interesting but most painful 
chapter in human history. The early portions of 
biblical history abound in facts and allusions to 
which we now refer. The Scriptures make frequent 
mention of the idolatrous worship of the nations, 
that originally inhabited Palestine and the countries 
in its vicinity. Moloch was a god of the Canaanites 
and the Phsenicians. References are made to the 
worship of this cruel deity in Jeremiah, 7; 31, 32; 
19: 6-14; in Isaiah 30: 33, and also in the second 
book of Kings, 23 : 10. Baal also, so often mention- 
ed in the Bible, was one of the deities of the 
Phaenicians and was worshipped especially at Tyre. 
Human sacrifices were sometimes offered to this 
god ; but less frequently than to Moloch. Baal- 
Peor was a god or goddess of the Moabites. An- 
other of the Moabitish deities is mentioned in the 
Scriptures under the name of Chemosh, Numb. 21 : 
29, Jer. 48: 7, 13. The calf which is mentioned in 



GROWTH OF THE IDEA OF GOD. \%>j 

Exodus 32 : 4, 5, and the two calves erected by Jer- 
oboam in the cities of Dan and Bethel, were evidently 
made in imitation of the Egyptian deities, the Apis 
worshipped at Memphis and the Muevis at Heliop- 
olis. In some parts of Egypt, the region in the 
neighborhood of the ancient Sycopolis, the wolf was 
an object of worship. The northern nations of Eu- 
rope, those in particular inhabiting the region of 
the modern Denmark and Sweden, formed their idea 
of God by the deification of the warrior. Their 
highest ideal of man was the man of violence and of 
blood ; and the being, that was conceived by them 
as filling most completely this ideal, by violence and 
bloodshed, was their God. His name was Odin. 
His residence was in the city of Misgard. His pal- 
ace was Valhalla. Odin was the god of battles. 
The souls of heroes who had fallen in battle, ascend- 
ed to the highest places in the celestial city ; — re- 
newing around the halls of Valhalla the pleasures 
of mimic war, and drinking the Scandinavian nectar, 
from vessels formed from the skulls of their enemies. 
The adventures of Odin are found in the Odda and 
Voluopa. The sword of Odin and the great ham- 
mer of Thor, may be accepted as the appropriate 
symbols of the early northern deity; — the creation 
of imbruted intellects and ferocious hearts, and 
which reacted upon its own source, and in its turn 



1 8 8 ABSOL U TE RELIGION. 

consolidated and established revenge and inhuman- 
ity. 

The question now returns, what is God ? What 
is the idea which we may properly and truly attach 
to Him ? And we remark in the first place, that 
the God whom the holy heart loves is not a limited 
or human form, — such as the human mind in its 
weakness is apt to frame and adopt ; — a form seated 
somewhere high in the heavens, occupying some ele- 
vated chair of state, and holding in his hand the 
sceptre or sword of authority. This undoubtedly, is 
an improvement of that low and demoralizing belief, 
which finds him embodied in the lowest of the brute 
animals, or which locates him in an idol made of 
wood or stone ; although it is still a conception of 
God, which differs from this very low one, more in 
degree than in nature. Such a limited and formal 
conception of God — no matter how dignified and 
venerable the mental image under which he is rep- 
resented — is at variance with the letter and the 
spirit of the Bible; and compared with the true con- 
ception of the Infinite Mind, is low, materialistic, and 
unsatisfying. 

3. — The God whom the holy soul loves, is not 
the mere abstract idea of God. For although we 
may and do form such an abstract idea, yet it should 
be remembered, that the object for which the idea 



GROWTH OF THE IDEA OF GOD. 189 

stands, is not a mere abstraction like the idea which 
represents it, but is something positive and real. 
Nor can we in consequence of our limited and finite 
nature, love God even as an infinite positive Being, 
unless we at the same time make him present in his 
works, and love him and worship him in his works. 

The true God is God present, living, operating or 
in a word incarnate, in the universe of things; not 
identical with it, but wrapping the universality of 
created existences about Him as the clothing of his 
life, and embodying himself most distinctly and fully, 
in that which has the greatest receptivity of the 
Divine ; and therefore becoming more and more 
fully incarnated in man, in proportion as he pro- 
gresses in the divine life, and can say, Christ is 
within me. 

Now with such a God and thus received, it is 
easy to see, what a change must soon take place in 
the affairs of the world. If man could in any way 
be led fully to believe, that his brother man is a man- 
ifestation of God, that the Divine is in him and 
hovers over him and around him, — always to some 
extent and always endeavoring to incarnate itself 
mere and more, — would it be possible for him to treat 
his fellow-man as he has done ; to cast him into 
dungeons, to tear him with pincers, to burn him in 
the flames, to smite him and crush him in bloody 



IQO ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

wars ? Would it be in his thought and his nature, 
thus to smite and destroy man, as the history of the 
world shows that he has done, if he could be led to 
the truth of the divine locality, and understood, that 
God could and would not be separated from man ? 
Truly recognizing God as existent in humanity, 
would it be possible for him to hold his brother man 
in slavery or to maltreat him and injure him in any 
way whatever? And reverencing God also in wo- 
man, could he make her the slave of all servile 
drudgeries, brutalizing her body through the brutal- 
ization of the intellect and the heart, and through 
long ages, as he has done, causing her to droop her 
head in sadness and to shed tears of blood ? It is 
obvious what great and glorious results would fol- 
low from the adoption of a true idea of God, not 
only concerning man and woman, but also concern- 
ing the beast of the field and the fowls of the air. 



CHAPTER XX. 

Of the Satisfaction of Divine Justice. 

I. — Christ suffers and dies for sinners. A substi- 
tute for transgressors is found in the crucified Son 
of Mary. Divine Justice is satisfied. The atonement 
is made. Such are the expressions which are often 
heard in the creeds and teachings of the existing 
churches. Similar expressions are found in the 
Bible. " He is wounded for our transgressions ; he 
is bruised for our iniquities." " Behold the Lamb 
of God, who taketh away the sins of the world." 
The true and interior meaning of such expressions, 
the meaning which is adapted to that higher devel- 
opment of the human race which exists at the pres- 
ent time, — may be supposed to be as follows. 

2. — When .we say that Christ suffered on the 
Cross, or suffered in any way, we make the inquiry 
in connection with such expressions, as we are con- 
stantly making the inquiry in other connections, 
Who and what is Christ? Christ is not merely an 
outward form, not merely a physical organization ; 



192 



ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 



but a living principle, a spiritual Essentiality or Di 
vine Love ; Christ not only was but is. The Christ* 
spirit — we do not say every man who bears out- 
wardly the name of Christ, — but the Christ-spirit, the 
Essential Christ, does everything and suffers every- 
thing which can be justly done and suffered for 
transgressors. This is right. And nothing short 
of this is right. The Christ-spirit compared with 
any and every other principle of life, is the spirit of 
all knowledge, of all truth, of all joy, all glory. 
Freed from the disturbing and blinding influences 
of self, it sees where the sinner does not see ; it 
knows where the sinner does not know. It has 
strength where the transgressor is weak. It has 
heaven in its present and its future, with the knowl- 
edge, that the sinner has no heritage of happiness, 
either now or hereafter if he continues in his sins 
It is right therefore that the Essential Christ should 
suffer. It was right that he should suffer upon the 
Cross. It is right that he should suffer now. 

4. — Divine Justice, the divine perception of the 
absolute right, requires that the true people of God 
should sympathize with, should act and should more 
or less suffer, for the good of sinners. Divine Jus- 
tice is not satisfied, and cannot be satisfied, till this 
divine ransom of toil and suffering, — without which 
the Christ-spirit would fail to be the Christ-spirit,— 



THE SATISFACTION OF DIVINE JUSTICE. IO/ 3 

is fully paid. The child of God who is not willing 
to act and suffer for God's cause, by doing good to 
others who stand in need of his labors, cannot claim 
to be the child of God. And therefore it may be 
truly said, that Divine Justice in such a case is not 
satisfied. When Christ died justice was satisfied. 
He did that which it was right or just for him to do. 

5. — At this point it is possible, that a simple illus- 
tration may aid us in understanding the subject. A 
person for instance is a physiologist. Through the 
good providence of God which has watched over 
him and instructed him, he has been made acquaint- 
ed with the mechanism and laws of the human con- 
stitution ; and understands perfectly what injurious 
and destructive results follow from intemperance in 
eating and drinking. I think that such a man is 
bound, in other words, that " divine justice" requires 
him to communicate such information to his brother 
man for his good ; although it may cost him time, 
labor, opposition, rebuke, persecution. And when 
he has done his duty in this respect, then and not 
till then divine justice is satisfied. 

If Christ, with all his knowledge and love, with 
his deep insight into the causes and consequences 
of sin, had failed to stand up as a teacher, or had 
failed to verify his teachings by patient endurance 
and suffering even unto death, he could not have 
9 



I g4 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

said, " I have finished the work which Thou gavest 
me to do." John 17: 4. And it was in this way, 
that Christ or the Essential Love Life satisfied, what 
the divine or perfect justice required. A very dif- 
ferent sort of satisfaction and nearly the reverse of 
what it is generally supposed to be. 

6. — Now all who are Christ's people, just so far 
as they are like Christ, possess the true Christ na- 
ture which is love, and are called to proclaim the 
truth, although this necessarily brings them into an- 
tagonism with error, which involves in the course of 
the conflict, more or less of trial and suffering. It is 
a great truth, therefore a permanent truth, if God's 
people under any circumstances fail to labor and 
suffer for the good of transgressors up to the light 
which is given them, the divine justice fails to be 
satisfied. The cross therefore, namely, labor and 
suffering for the good of others, becomes a perma- 
nent fact, a divine and unchangeable necessity un- 
der a government of which God who is Love is the 
great Centre. 



CHAPTER XXI. 

The Doctrine of a Judgment affirmed by Absolute 

Religion, 

i. — It is undoubtedly a doctrine of Christianity, 
and is the accepted opinion of the sects or denomi- 
nations which exist under the name of Christians, 
that man both in his actions and character is sus- 
ceptible of being judged ; and that such judgment 
will certainly come upon him. And such, in the 
grand harmony of Christian truth with the highest 
human intelligence, is the affirmation of the Abso- 
lute Religion. 

2. — And first we will consider the subject in re- 
spect to individuals. We find evidence that men 
individually, that every man no matter what may be 
his situation, is properly the subject of a judicial pro- 
cess, and cannot by any possibility escape being ul- 
timately brought to judgment, in the great fact that 
he is created with a judge in his own bosom. Con- 
science considered in connection with the intellect, 



I96 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

which furnishes the facts upon which its decisions 
are founded, constitutes a tribunal which exists in 
perpetual session ; and out of its own interior and 
wonderful resources, consummates the verdict which 
it gives of a good or evil action, of a good or evil 
life, with a correspondent reward on the one hand, 
or a correspondent punishment on the other. Some- 
times the reward or punishment is realized in out- 
ward good or outward sorrow, in the deprivation of 
external comforts or in the enrichment of external 
gifts; but whether this be the case or not, the rec- 
ompenses of the soul in one form or the other, the 
joys or sorrows of conscience can never fail. 

3. — And this is so because it cannot be other 
wise. If holiness or justice is a part of God's na- 
ture, — and without this God ceases to be God, — 
then it is impossible for him to create a being, with 
the voluntary and intelligent capacities of good and 
evil, without at the same time making him responsi- 
ble for such good and evil. Man is judged because 
the tribunal exists in himself; and the tribunal ex- 
ists there, because God in making man could not be- 
come a contradiction to himself; and could not act 
in violation or neglect of the eternal and essential 
principles which lie hidden in his own divine na- 
ture. 

4. — And let us look further, at the practical re- 



DOCTRINE OF A JUDGMENT AFFIRMED. jg^ 

suits. If man were not liable to be brought to judg- 
ment, and were not restrained and regulated in his 
conduct by the knowledge of this liability, what 
conflict and wrong and fraud and oppression would 
be likely to follow ! In such a state of things, 
where everything would be regulated by power in- 
dependent of justice, existence itself would cease to 
be a blessing. 

Looking at the subject in whatever way we will, 
the voice of eternal reason giving itself utterance in 
the Absolute Religion, agrees with Revealed Reli- 
gion in the fact, that the book of the judgment is, 
and from the nature of the case must be opened; 
that the sentence is and must be executed ; that 
under the figurative expressions of the Scriptures, 
as well as under the dogmatic formulas of religious 
creeds, there lies a great and unchangeable verity 
which cannot be unheeded. 

5. — And it remains to be added that men are not 
only judged in their individual capacity, but they 
necessarily take their share of the judgment which 
falls upon all corporate bodies and associations and 
communities, of which they are members. The life 
of such associations and communities is made up of 
individual life ; the responsibility of such complex 
bodies, formed for ends which involve moral results, 
is the aggregate of individual responsibilities ; and 



jog ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

the reward which attends the associated good-doing, 
and the punishment which follows the associated 
evil-doing, reach all the individuals. 

And therefore it may be said as a philosophical 
affirmation, and it is found to be true as a matter of 
fact, that families and neighborhoods are judged, 
that towns and cities are judged, that all business 
corporations are judged, that nations are judged, that 
worlds are judged. And thus it will be found, that 
the great and overshadowing fact of judgment ex- 
tends to everything which is capable of being judged ; 
although it is true, that it necessarily varies in the 
form which it puts on, and in its degree, with the 
great variety of things, and the modification and 
character of things to which it applies ; but taking 
place under the adjustments of a Being who never 
errs, the judgment always is just. 



CHAPTER XXII. 

The Doctrine of Heaven and Hell. 

I. — It is a fact worthy of consideration because it 
involves principles that have a permanent foundation, 
that all religions have their heaven and hell. The 
Absolute Religion which, though really first in time, 
comes latest in the historical succession of religions, 
and which tries to expound those that have gone 
before it and to adjust them to each other, teaches 
that heaven and hell are facts of mental experience, 
in other words are states of the mind, rather than lo- 
calities. It is true that the Absolute Religion, in 
taking this important position, does not necessarily 
deny locality as something which is predicable of 
such facts of experience. And it does not do this, 
for the simple and sufficient reason, that locality is a 
necessary incident of finiteness ; and that it is im- 
possible to have an idea of finite beings, without 
having an idea of the place which they occupy. 
But the Absolute doctrine though it does not by any 



200 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

means exclude the consideration of locality or place, 
is understood to deal primarily and chiefly with the 
intrinsic or essential nature, rather than with the 
forms and incidents of things. 

2. — It is not easy to give definitions which will 
be satisfactory to all. But perhaps it will be suffi- 
cient to say, that Heaven in its essential nature, is 
that state of inward experience which excludes 
doubt and sorrow, and which is the subject of all that 
happiness, which results from a harmony with the 
immutable law of right, including as the necessary 
result of such harmony, the approbation of God, 
and full and happy communion with. him. 

It is not necessary to assert, however, that this is 
the best statement which is possible to be made of 
the absolute or essential heaven. It is sufficient to 
know, that the statement embracing essentially these 
ideas cannot vary greatly from these terms. 

3. — And now we proceed to say, that the doctrine 
under consideration results necessarily from the fact, 
that the subjects or inhabitants of the state called 
Heaven, are spiritual or mental beings. It is very 
true, and it is one of the results of the additional fact 
that they are finite beings, that they are clothed in 
bodily or material forms ; but there is a great differ- 
ence between the clothing or forms of things, and 
the substance or essence of things. It cannot be 



THE DOCTRINE OF HE A VEN AND HELL. 201 

said that men in their intrinsic nature are material, 
nor can it be said that the laws which govern them 
are material, but the facts, laws and experiences per- 
taining to the essential man, in a word anything and 
everything which goes to constitute the interior 
man in distinction from the outward man, is wholly 
of a spiritual nature. For instance, man in his phys- 
ical or material nature has an outward form and out- 
ward organs ; and in the possession and exercise of 
such organs, he does, and suffers, and enjoys those 
things, which are appropriate to such an organiza- 
tion ; but it is hardly necessary to say, that in his 
mental or spiritual nature it is very different. His 
internal action, in distinction from his outward ot 
physical action, is the activity of a spiritual nature ; 
and he does, and suffers, and enjoys those things, 
which are appropriate to spirit. 

4. — We cannot delay in order to go into particu- 
lars to any great extent. One or two illustrations 
will answer. Man for instance has a conscience. 
By means of conscience, using the term in the more 
general sense as indicating the whole moral nature, 
he discriminates between right and wrong. And 
when he acts in accordance with the right, he is 
happy ; and when he does wrong he suffers. Man 
also has affectional susceptibilities, including the 
great and controlling power in his spiritual nature 
9* 



202 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

which enables him to love ; and in the exercise of 
this benevolent principle, which always operates in 
the direction of good to others, he finds an ample 
and rich reward in his own nature. His failure to 
exercise it, on the contrary, and the indulgence 
without adequate cause of hostile feelings, is attend- 
ed, according to a wise law of being, with a corre- 
spondent unhappiness to himself. So that happiness 
resulting from conformity with spiritual laws, con- 
stitutes heaven ; and unhappiness resulting from a 
violation of these laws constitutes hell. The same 
general principles which apply to the one apply to 
the other. . 

5. — And this is not all. It can be said also and 
in such a way that contradiction cannot easily have 
a place, that there is a fixed and necessary discrimi- 
nation between them ; a gulf of separation, excavated 
by differences of nature which can never be filled up ; 
so that in their interior and distinctive nature 
heaven can never become hell, and hell can never 
become heaven. Philosophers tell us that there is 
an immutable distinction between right and wrong ; 
right in its essential nature can never become wrong, 
and wrong can never become right. But in study- 
ing the relations of ultimate ideas and facts, we shall 
find that right and wrong are in a very important 
sense the foundations of heaven and hell ; that they 



THE DOCTRINE OF HEA VEN AND HELL. 203 

are the essential basis upon which heaven and hell 
are erected ; and that the affirmation of an immuta- 
ble distinction and separation between them, is vir- 
tually an affirmation of a like distinction and separ- 
ation of that which grows out of them. 

And if it should be affirmed at this point, that 
these statements have reference rather to identity 
than to duration, and that the existence and the 
distinctive difference of both may be conceded, with- 
out involving the fact of their unchangeable perma- 
nency, then it remains to be added further, that, inas- 
much as it is impossible to conceive of a moral uni- 
verse where right and wrong are not, so it is 
impossible to conceive of such an universe where 
heaven and hell are not. So that on philosophical 
principles, heaven and hell are not more immutable 
and distinctive in their nature, than they are un- 
changeable and eternal in their duration. And ac- 
cordingly it is not enough to affirm the naked fact 
of the existence of heaven and hell; but the truth 
in its absolute form requires us to affirm also, that 
there is an eternal heaven and an eternal hell. 

6. — The Absolute Religion affirms also, although 
it may be conceded that it is not a matter which is 
equal in importance, the locality of heaven and hell. 
Heaven and hell in their essential nature exist in 
beings ; and in beings of whom it can be said that 



204 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

they have perceptions, emotions and conscience ; 
in beings, who are not simply existences but person- 
alities. But it is a primary conception or thought 
of the human mind, that such beings and indeed any 
beings, of whom it can be said that they are finite 
and not infinite, have and must have limitations, 
boundaries, outlines, form, which in fact constitute 
one of the essential differences between the finite 
and the Infinite, and which necessarily carry with 
them the idea of locality or place. Affirm of any 
being or thing, that it has outline and form, and you 
necessarily imply and affirm of it, that it must be 
and is in one place rather than another ; in other 
words, that it has place; and that place or locality 
can no more be separated from it than outline or 
form can be separated from it. 

Furthermore it is well known that philosophical 
thinkers often speak of the fitness of things. And in 
such a sense that they not only accept of it as a 
speculative truth, but fully believe in it and reason 
from it as an available and important basis of argu- 
ment, in ascertaining and adjusting the position of 
one thing considered in relation to another. And 
the Absolute Religion, in harmony with this view, 
utters as one of its truths, that it is not agreeable to 
the fitness of things, in other words that it is not an 
appropriate, well adjusted, and fitting thing, that 



THE DOCTRINE OF HEA VEN AND HELL. 2 0$ 

heaven and hell should be thought to be without 
law, and should move their locality at random, and 
should be here and there and anywhere and every- 
where, without regard to the relative situation, and 
the rights and claims, and progress, and histories of 
other beings and other localities ; and thus disturb, 
if it were a possible thing, the unchangeable harmo- 
nies of the universe. And therefore it can be said 
for this and for other reasons, especially in view of 
the great law of attraction, which compels the asso- 
ciation and permanent neighborhood of those who 
have likeness of character, that heaven and hell 
have not only a locality but a fixed and ascertaina- 
ble locality, so that no one in the future life will 
have any difficulty in knowing his own place. 

7. — And still further, the Absolute Religion af- 
firms, in accordance with the expressions that are 
found in the revealed or written religions, that 
heaven and hell have their Avails and gates, theii 
trees of life, their golden harps, and their flaming 
fires ; with the liberty however, of substituting in a 
proper manner the inward meaning for the outward 
letter, and the great substance for the metaphorical 
shadow. The walls and gates, divested of their 
metaphorical import, are the ideas, truths, or laws 
of life, which attach to finite existences in every sit- 
uation, and which indicate the boundaries or limits 



20 6 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

which they cannot pass. Not walls or gates in the 
material sense, not something visible and tangible 
which has been fashioned and set up by human 
hands or any other finite agency; but they are not 
the less real on that account ; and may be said to 
possess even greater strength and permanency. 
They cannot be broken through as material walls 
can, or undermined, or over-leaped, or worn out ; but 
they stand forever. And in like manner the tree of 
life, and the waters of life, and the golden harps, 
and the flaming fires, if they do not express like 
walls and gates, the limitations of position and ac- 
tion, will be found on a proper interpretation, to 
imply and to express certain forms of inward expe- 
rience both good and evil. There are joys and 
griefs of the spirit as well as physical joys and griefs ; 
joys and griefs which do not depend upon positive 
and arbitrary enactments, but which necessarily re- 
sult from the practical relation of our lives to the 
laws of right and wrong, and without which heaven 
and hell could have no existence. 

8. — And lastly the Absolute Religion, speaking 
alike in all lands and all languages and all intellects, 
not only announces the existence of heaven and 
hell, and with the seal of eternity upon them, but 
proclaims with equal distinctness to the doer of 
good and evil, that there is no possible escape from 



THE DOCTRINE OF HE A VEN AND HELL. 



207 



them. They are not only facts but inheritances ; 
not only existences but are capable of being peopled 
and dwelt in. Such is the nature and fixed relation 
of things, that it can be said in terms which admit 
of no uncertainty, that the sinner is necessarily a 
sufferer ; and that the doer of good is necessarily 
happy, and that neither the one nor the other, 
neither the good man nor the sinner, can fly from 
the heaven or hell that is appropriate to him any 
more than he can fly from himself. The man who is 
excluded from the kingdom of love, and has his home 
and kingdom in himself, who in making self his cen 
tre is cast out of the All and is shut up in the one, 
who is sunk from the liberty of God into the sla- 
very of the creature, is in the truth and essence of 
Hell, whatever may be said of his locality. Hell 
therefore is a state of mind. And accordingly the 
Absolute Religion has no controversy with the doc- 
trine of Hell, whether found in the Christian Scrip- 
tures or anywhere else, because Hell when properly 
explained, is perceived to be, not a material Tophet 
or Gehenna, but a fact of the universal consciousness ; 
and what is more, it is an accepted problem of the 
primary or universal philosophy. Nor has it any 
controversy with the doctrine of the locality of 
Hell ; because locality, when ideas are subjected to 
a suitable analysis, is a necessary incident to all 



20 3 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

finite beings ; and the locality which constitutes the 
place of Hell's subjects, necessarily constitutes the 
locality of Hell itself. 

The Absolute Religion accepts Hell just as it 
accepts Heaven, and it accepts both of them, not 
only because they are matters of observation and 
consciousness, but because the unchangeable affirma- 
tion of philosophy proclaim the necessity of their 
being. And it accepts the locality of Heaven (a lo- 
cality but not necessarily a fixed locality,) for the 
same reason that it accepts the locality of Hell. 



CHAPTER XXIII. 

Of the Sin against the Holy Ghost, or the Sin which 
cannot be forgiven. 

I. — The doctrine of forgiveness of sin cannot be 
understood in all its aspects, without some specific 
reference to the doctrine of sin itself. The Scrip- 
tures recognize two kinds of sin. And accordingly 
as forgiveness has relation to sin, it modifies itself in 
accordance with the nature of the sin to be for- 
given ; — taking effect in some cases and not in others. 
The first of the two forms of sin to which reference 
has been made, is sometimes called in the Scriptures 
the " sin of ignorance." Much account is made of 
this sin in the code of Moses. See Levit. 4: 2-13, 
Numb. 15 : 24-30. This form of sin, which is that 
of which the Apostle Paul was especially guilty, 1st 
Tim. I : 13, and to which he refers in his address to 
the Athenians on Mars Hill, Acts 17: 30, results in 
part from the imperfection of man's finite condition. 
His experience is limited. His knowledge is neces- 



210 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

sarily small in the beginning. He advances amid 
many obstacles and drawbacks. And without know- 
ing precisely what he does, and without the specific 
intention of doing evil, he oftentimes does those 
things which are injurious either to himself or oth- 
ers. This is that " time of ignorance which God 
winks at." God does not exact from the weak- 
nesses and imperfections of man's childhood, that 
which he may properly exact from his advanced 
maturity. 

2. — -The second form of sin is a sin of knowledge, 
and therefore of deliberate intention. It is the sin 
of those, who either know or who might know if 
they would employ their faculties to that purpose, 
what sin is. It is, therefore, the sin of the heart ; 
and has in it that element of pride and obstinacy 
which is the essence of blasphemy. The person who 
commits it is described in the book of Numbers, as the 
man who " doeth aught presumptuously ; " and there- 
fore in distinction from the sin of ignorance, it might 
properly be denominated the sin of presumption. 
It is the sin of Goliah of Gath, who defied the armies 
of the living God, and of all that unbelieving, proud 
and violent class of men, whom the Philistines rep- 
resent ; although it undoubtedly and very often ex- 
ists in different degrees of openness and boldness. 
It is the sin of Ananias and Sapphira, who deliber- 



SIN WHICH CANNOT BE FORGIVEN 2 II 

ately withheld from God what they knew belonged 
to Him. It is the sin of Judas who, standing for 
years in the clearness of the light of the Son of God, 
did yet betray Him. It is the sin in some degree 
at least, of all men, and of every man at all times and 
in every age of the world, who does not cheerfully 
and fully act up to the light within him. 

3. — The distinction between these kinds or forms 
of sin is often made, with greater or less degree of 
distinctness, in writers on the history of Philosophic 
Opinions, on Natural Law, and on Moral Philoso- 
phy ; — not excluding some philosophic writers among 
the early Greeks and Romans. In Latin writers the 
sin of ignorance or any form of sin, which indicated 
weakness and imperfection, rather than deliberate 
evil intention, was denominated culpa or was ex- 
pressed by some other equivalent term, while the 
deliberate or "presumptuous" sin was denominated 
crimen. 

4. — Now keping in mind this fundamental dis- 
tinction in the forms of transgression, and connect- 
ing it with forgiveness, which implies in its higher 
and celestial sense not only overlooking a wrong, 
and passing it by, but also loving harmonization, we 
are prepared to add that the sin of ignorance can 
be forgiven. It is a sin of the head rather than of 
the heart ; and not only can be forgiven, but ought 



212 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

to be and must be forgiven by all who are the true 
children of God. But the sin which is described in 
the Bible as the " sin of presumption," cannot be for- 
given in that higher and true sense which has been 
mentioned, because it is both a sin of knowledge and 
a sin of the heart. It is deliberate, self-confident 
and defiant ; and therefore cannot be forgiven inas- 
much as it rejects forgiveness. The sin of those 
who crucified Christ, great as it was, could be for- 
given. Some of them undoubtedly thought, as 
Paul in his persecutions of the church, that they 
were doing God's service. Christ prayed " Father, 
forgive them /or they know not what they do" But 
he says nothing about forgiveness of the sin of 
Judas, who cannot be supposed to have sinned in 
ignorance, but to have known well that he was sac- 
rificing a good and holy man from a purely selfish 
consideration. 

5. — With these explanations we are enabled per- 
haps better to understand the statement in Mat- 
thew 12:31. " Wherefore I say unto you, all manner 
of sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven unto men ; 
but the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost shall not 
be forgiven unto men. And whosoever speaketh a 
word against the Son of man it shall be forgiven 
Him. But whosoever speaketh against the Holy 
Ghost, it shall not be forgiven him neither in this 



SIN WHICH CANNOT BE FORGIVEN 21 3 

world, neither in the world to come." In this pas- 
sage, which harmonizes with what has already been 
said of the sin of ignorance, and the sin of presump- 
tion, we have two forms of sin brought together and 
placed side by side, namely the sin against the Son 
of man and the sin against the Holy Ghost ; and 
they are so far essentially distinct from each other, 
that one can be forgiven, the other cannot. To 
speak against the Son of Man, as we understand it, 
is to speak against or controvert on the ground of 
imperfect knowledge, the doctrine of a Personal 
Christ : — for instance, the predictions which have re 
lation to Him, the facts of his incarnation, the varied 
incidents of his history and other things. It is obvi- 
ous, that this is a sin which is consistent with a de- 
gree of sincerity ; and which in being sincere, is 
likely to work itself out into the truth. It is a sin 
therefore which can be forgiven. But the sin against 
the Holy Ghost, that deliberate form of it which is 
expressed in the Greek word translated blasphemy, 
which is sin against the Internal or Essential Christ 
in distinction from the outward or personal Christ, 
cannot be forgiven. 

6. — There appears to be, and there undoubtedly 
is, a great philosophical principle involved in the 
statement which Christ makes ; as in point of fact it 



214 



ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 



will generally be found that such biblical facts and 
statements everywhere involve principles. 

The Bible viewed beneath the surface of its facts, 
and in the light of an interior spiritual interpreta- 
tion, is a book of principles. And the principle here 
is this. Errors of judgment, mistakes arising from 
unintentional ignorance, even unholy affections aris- 
ing from mere misapprehension and every thing of 
that kind may be forgiven. But the sin against the 
Holy Ghost in its essence is selfishness, and is delib- 
erate and persistent. The Holy Ghost, whatever 
may be said of his manifestations or his Personality, 
is God in his nature. And union therefore on the 
part of God, with those who sin against the Holy 
Ghost, is an impossibility, because it would be the 
union of things which at the same time are divided 
against each other — of love and selfishness, of God 
and satan. And forgiveness therefore, which always 
involves the fact of union, when it exists in its high- 
est and truest sense, is necessarily excluded under 
such circumstances. 



CHAPTER XXIV. 

Prayer in its Relation to the Absolute Religion, 

I. — Prayer, in its analysis and its foundation, 
necessarily involves the fact of the existence and 
the presence of two personalities — of God who is 
prayed to and of man who prays. Prayer in utter- 
ance is not merely and exclusively petitionary ; but 
includes both supplication and adoration. The ba- 
sis of these two forms, or that which entitles them 
to an uttered existence, is found in the character of 
the being who is prayed to. God can always give 
what we ask for; and his character, perfect in all its 
attributes, is worthy of the highest adoration. So 
far as this, we have a basis of fact and thought 
which is unchangeable, and which to this extent 
evidently brings the doctrine of Prayer within the 
limits of the Absolute Religion. 

2. — As we advance further, however, we are 
obliged to admit, that the common doctrine on the 
subject of prayer may be regarded as somewhat at 



2 1 6 ABSOL UTE. RELIGION. 

fault. The doctrine to which we refer is, that God 
is necessarily unimpressible, or as the theologians 
commonly express it, that he is impassive ; in other 
words, that though he hears he cannot be moved, 
and that in the possession of all knowledge, he is 
nevertheless without emotions and affections, be- 
cause his plans being founded in infinite wisdom are 
fixed and inflexible, and his emotions and affections, 
which have their antecedence and basis in the facts 
of existence, are necessarily as fixed and " impas- 
sive " as his immovable plans. We do not deny 
that this is a view, which, properly understood and 
under proper limitations, embraces an important 
truth. But when not accepted with these condi- 
tions, it cannot be regarded as the whole truth, and 
perhaps it would be correct to say, that it is a seri- 
ous and injurious perversion of the truth. It should 
be kept in mind that man is not a mere idealism or 
fiction in the world of existences ; but in a true and 
substantial sense of the term a reality. Next to 
God, because he is in a true and especial sense the 
child of God, he is the great fact of the universe ; 
vast in powers, complicated and yet wisely adjusted 
in the methods of mental action, and eternal in his 
duration. 

3. — And further it is a necessity, that God's ex- 
istence being without limitations, should correspond 



ON PR A YER. 2 1 7 

to, embrace, and harmonize with all other existen- 
ces. Man cannot pray without God's hearing his 
prayer ; and he cannot offer a prayer, so far as the 
element of desire is a part of it, without God's an- 
swering ; although the way or method of answering 
is not always perceived. Such a prayer being a fact 
in his existence, it is necessarily a fact known: and 
being a fact and being known as a fact, it cannot by 
any possibility be disregarded. God is moved by it. 
4. — But can it not be said, that God himself by 
his own interior operation made the prayer. Such 
is sometimes the doctrine. And yet, even if 
something can be said in favor of that view, 
can it not be said with far greater truth, that God 
made man, and that in the exercise of the powers 
and responsibilities God had given him, man made 
the prayer ? God and man, though standing in the 
closest relationship, are not identical. It is a mis- 
taken and erroneous philosophy which asserts it. 
Man from the moment of his creation became a 
part of the universe ; as we have already said, not a 
fiction or pretence or mere semblance of being, but 
a reality ; not a thing made to be ignored ; not a 
thing made to be dashed to pieces ; not a mere 
plaything to be laughed at, contemned, trifled with 
and thrown aside at will. God does not work in 
that way. God is a serious being and very far from 



2 1 8 ABSOL UTE RELIGION. 

being a thoughtless trifler ; and when he does a 
thing he does it seriously and in wisdom, and he 
does it for permanency ; and all his dealings with 
man are stamped and sealed with justice. Remem- 
ber therefore that man is really and truly man ; and 
when he prays at all, his prayer is and must be a 
prayer and nothing else ; and God hears because 
the ear of his knowledge is infinite and cannot be 
shut ; and God answers the prayer by corresponding 
to it in wisdom and goodness, because the love of 
his heart is infinite, and it is not possible for him to 
ignore or to trample on the desires of the children 
whom he has made. It is thus and cannot be oth- 
erwise. 

But this is not argument, perhaps some will say. 
And this in a certain sense may be true. But if it 
is not argument in the ordinary sense, it is some- 
thing higher than argument ; it is both the intui- 
tion of the intellect and the affirmation of the heart. 
And now it is to be remembered that we are speak- 
ing of prayer, and not of the mere appearance or 
pretence of prayer. 

We have already said that prayer necessarily in- 
volves two things, first the Being who is prayed to ; 
second the being who prays. And we may add also, 
prayer involves a desire of the object which calls 
forth the prayer, and faith in God as the giver of that 



ON PRAYER. 219 

ior which we ask. And it is hardly necessary to add 
that there must be sincerity in all. And now, look- 
ing at the matter in the light of the Absolute Reli- 
gion, in the light of the highest reason, which is the 
intuitional reason, how is it possible in the nature of 
things that God can be insensible to, and take no 
cognizance of a sincere desire ? Let those who think 
so, go back to first principles, and find out if possible 
what God is. 

But remember also that prayer has faith in it. 
But faith in God as the answerer of prayer in his 
own good time and way and wisdom, which is con- 
fessedly implied and involved in faith, is wholly in- 
compatible with the idea that God is an impassive 
being, and is not moved by our supplications. 
• 5. — But how can it be possible, says one, that God 
who is Infinite should be moved by the finite ? I 
ask in return, how is it possible that God who is In- 
finite should not be moved by the finite ? The In- 
finity of God, who is not only an infinity of knowl- 
edge but an infinity of feeling, implies and requires 
that all the facts of the finite should be known, and 
also that all the feelings which are appropriate to 
this knowledge should be actually experienced. It 
cannot be otherwise. The failure to experience all 
the feelings which are appropriate to all existing facts, 
would imply and would establish an imperfection 



220 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

in his character. To accept God in the infini- 
tude of knowledge, and to curtail Him in the infini- 
tude of feeling, is to mutilate Him in one of his most 
essential attributes and to make him unworthy of 
reverence. If He knows a thing and feeling is truly 
appropriate to that thing, then it follows that feeling 
is a necessity. And hence it is not merely as a dog- 
matic declaration, but as a requisition of the Abso- 
lute of things, that not a sparrow falleth to the 
ground without his notice, and that he will not allow 
the husbandman to " muzzle the ox that treadeth out 
the corn." And does He not care for man, as well as 
for oxen and the birds of the air? Does He num- 
ber the hairs of our heads, and have no respect for 
the petitions of the heart? Does he not pity man's 
sorrows and hear his cries and honor his faith ? 

When men know God only by the intellect, they 
may be at a loss on these questions; but when they 
know him by the comprehension of the heart, they 
know what the answer is, and there can be no other. 

The plain language of Scripture therefore, and 
the doctrine commonly received, that God is a hearer 
and answerer of prayer, that He takes an interest in 
all our wants and does not fail to respond to them, 
is a doctrine also of the Absolute Religion. And 
every friend and advocate of the Absolute Religion 
may know assuredly, first by reason and secondly 



ON PRAYER. 221 

by experience if he will make the experiment, 
that when he prays to God, God will hear him. The 
true parent loves to have his children ask for what 
they want. And so of God, He could not listen to 
the petition, if he did not love to answer it. The 
two things would be incompatible. The outward 
expression of that which is within, is a necessity. It 
is true that this expression in its modes is very va- 
rious. There is verbal expression ; there is the ex- 
pression of the countenance, there is the expression 
of action. The fullest expression of joy or of sorrow 
is generally found to require the combination of all 
these. In point of fact, man wants and he receives ; 
he has needs and he has supplies. The existence of 
wants necessitates prayer ; it may exist merely in the 
form of desire, or it may go further and embody it- 
self in expression : but in either case, it is prayer. 

It may perhaps be said, that God who is omnis- 
cient knows our wants ; and there is no necessity of 
expression. But expression takes place of itself, and 
is a necessary attendant of want ; and it is doubtful, 
whether the want could possibly be supplied with- 
out an expression in some of its forms. 



CHAPTER XXV. 

Relation of Faith to Salvation. 

I. — It is one of the doctrines of the Christian reli- 
gion, as those doctrines are accepted and expounded 
by the great mass of its professors, that salvation is 
by means of faith. "He that believeth shall be 
saved." u He that believeth on the Son hath ever- 
lasting life." These and numerous other sayings and 
passages express or imply this fixed relation between 
salvation considered as a result, and faith as a 
means leading to that result. The doctrine of sal- 
vation by faith is not only an affirmation of the 
Scriptures ; but when carefully looked into, will be 
found to harmonize with the philosophy of the 
mind, and is entitled to be received as an affirma- 
tion of enlightened reason. And if so, the doctrine 
which is announced in the Scriptures, and the doc- 
trine of the Absolute Religion on the subject, are 
not at variance ; but the former is accepted and 
illustrated by the latter. 

2. — In saying, however, that salvation is by 



RE LA TION OF FAITH TO SAL VA TION. 



223 



means of faith, and that the doctrine of salvation 
considered as thus originated, is in harmony with 
the requisitions of reason and sound philosophy, it 
is necessary to inquire, in the first place, what we 
are to understand by salvation. We read in the 
wonderful prayer, recorded in the latter part of 
John's Gospel ; " Neither pray I for these alone ; 
but for them also which shall believe on me through 
their word ; that they all may be one, as Thou, Fa- 
ther, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be 
one in us." Union with God, — a state or condition 
of mind extending to the most interior depths of 
our nature, in which the human affections and the 
human will are fully harmonized, and made one with 
the heart and will of the Infinite, — was Christ's 
prayer for his people. A prayer uttered in circum- 
stances which show that he understood the union 
which he prayed for, as not only indicating the 
highest and noblest of all possible inward or psychi- 
cal processes, but as including the highest possible 
good. And this, setting aside what may be said, 
and to some extent rightly and profitably said, of a 
local heaven, which may be regarded as only an in- 
cident of salvation and not identical with its essen- 
tial nature, is our definition of it, namely, UNION 
WITH GOD ; a state of the soul ; a heart, wherever 
it may be found, and whether in earth or in heaven, 



224 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

throbbing in all its pulsations, in harmony with the 
divine heart, in unity of thought, in unity of feeling 
and purpose, and in unity of life. Such is salva- 
tion ; and he who is the subject of this experience 
is saved. 

3. — Salvation as thus defined is and must be by 
faith. It is well known that the doctrine or philos- 
ophy of faith, in itself considered, implies and re 
quires an object to which faith attaches itself. In 
every case where there is an exercise of faith, there 
is and must be something which is believed in. To 
believe and yet with nothing believed in, is an ab- 
surdity in the philosophy of the operations of the 
mind, analogous to a contradiction in mathematics. 
And accordingly the first experience in the series 
of mental conditions, which constitute the great fact 
of unity with God, is belief or faith in the existence 
of God. We must believe that God is. It requires 
no argument to show, that without such belief as 
this, the mental experience, called union with God, 
becomes in the mental sense, which is the only true 
and essential sense, an impossibility. 

4. — Again, we must believe not only in the ex- 
istence of God but in his rectitude ; in other words 
that he will do what will be right towards us ; that 
he will dispense and withhold, that he will guide 
and sustain us, or at times leave us without percep- 



RELA TION OF FAITH TO SAL VA TION. 



225 



tible guidance and without perceptible support, and 
do anything and everything else, always and under 
all circumstances in accordance with what is right. 
And the reason is this, the human mind is so consti- 
tuted, that it naturally and necessarily forms the idea 
of rectitude or right. And not only this, on any 
subject on which it is properly enlightened, it may 
be said always to approve the right and to love it ; 
and on the other hand always to disapprove the 
wrong, and to have feelings of aversion towards it. 
It is impossible, therefore, that man should enter 
into a state of harmony or union with God, without 
having faith in the divine rectitude. God is mind, 
and man in his essential nature is mind ; and with 
man's innate convictions and feelings in relation to 
rectitude, and without a full belief in God's rectitude, 
the true basis of harmony is wanting, and union with 
God under such circumstances cannot possibly exist. 
And therefore salvation fails. 

5. — And this is not all. In order to reach the 
salvation which is involved in a unity with the di- 
vine life, it is further necessary to believe that God 
accepts us, loves us, protects us, and is and will be a 
friend and father to us. This is one of the highest 
and most important acts of faith. But such are the 
laws and the generation of thought, that it is logic- 
ally and mentally impossible for us to do this, unless 



10^ 



226 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

we renounce evil in ourselves, or in the Scripture 
expression repent of sin. The harmony of ideas re- 
quires this. No man ever did or ever can believe in 
God as a friend and father to himself personally, and 
in the sense of an acceptance of himself into the re- 
lation of unity of life, so long as he is inwardly con- 
scious of doing things wilfully, which God disap- 
proves and forbids. It is intuitionally evident to the 
man who is in the habit of meditating mental prob- 
lems, that the states of mind, — namely, an inward 
consciousness of deliberately sinning against God, and 
a belief at the same time that God accepts, approves, 
and loves us and unites himself with us, — are not 
only antagonistic, but are mutually exclusive and 
destructive of each other. In other words, to be- 
lieve that God unites himself with us, when we are 
inwardly and mentally conscious of hostility to him, 
is to believe in contradictions. Belief, therefore, 
must not only exist in reference to its appropriate 
object, namely, a God who is not only righteous, but 
is recognized as righteous by ourselves ; but in taking 
a direction which will receive him into the intimacies 
of living and personal friendship, it must be a faith 
which will antecedently demand and will secure, as 
it gradually struggles into existence, all those con- 
ditions of repentance and spiritual renovation which 
render such a great result possible. 



RELA TION OF FAITH TO SAL VA TION. 



227 



6. — Such are some of the relations and applica- 
tions of faith in the matter of salvation. They are 
worthy of serious attention, and in their application 
involve some of the most important acts of the soul. 
They are not only Scriptural announcements, and 
entitled to acceptance on the ground of the source 
from which they come ; but are in harmony with the 
laws of the mind, and commend themselves to any 
reasonable philosophy. 



CHAPTER XXVI. 

Divine Influences, 

I. — The doctrine of Divine Influences, in other 
words that men are susceptible of being inwardly 
taught and guided by the Spirit of God, and that 
such teaching and guidance is apart of the spiritual 
and religious economy of the Universe, is a doctrine 
not only historically illustrated and confirmed in the 
ancient books of many nations, but is agreeable to 
the highest thought and reasonings of men, and 
therefore properly takes its place among the doc- 
trines of the Absolute Religion. Setting aside for 
the present the historical argument, which may be 
regarded as highly confirmatory, and looking at the 
subject in the light of intuition and reasoning alone, 
we may remark, in the first place, that the doctrine 
of divine influences flows naturally and necessarily 
from the fact, which we suppose now to be recog- 
nized and established, of the existence of God. God 
exists. And his existence as God makes Him the 
source of existence to all other beings. And it is 



DIVINE INFLUENCES. 



229 



certainly reasonable* to say, that his position as the 
source of being, entitles Him to the control, and not 
only gives the right but imposes the duty of control, 
over the beings He has created. He makes them 
what they are ; and it would not be possible for Him 
because it would not be right and just, to relieve 
himself from all responsibility in relation to them. 
And responsibility cannot be separated from any 
degree of guidance and control, which is necessary 
to meet the claims that the existing responsibility 
imposes. In a word God creates and therefore He 
rules. On this point when it is properly explained, 
there can hardly be a difference of opinion. 

2. — When we come to the subject of the kind or 
manner of the control which he is entitled to exer- 
cise, and which it is his duty to exercise, there may 
possibly be ground for some differences of thought. 
We may say however in general terms, that the 
manner of this control'must be determined by a con- 
sideration of the nature and relations of the beings 
respectively, who govern on the one hand, or are 
governed on the other. God is a spirit ; and man in 
his essential nature is a spirit also ; and having by 
means of our personal consciousness gained some 
knowledge of our own spiritual nature, we are as- 
sisted by that knowledge to some extent, in gaining 
a knowledge of the spiritual nature of God. And in 



230 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

affirming the doctrine of Divine Influences, the doc- 
trine of God operating upon man, and of man, in his 
mental nature accepting and responding to the di- 
vine influence, we are aided in meeting the problems 
involved in the subject, by a knowledge, that it is 
mind operating upon mind, and by a just considera- 
tion and application of known mental laws. 

3- — And accordingly we proceed to say, that the 
exercise of divine influence is not the application of 
material force, nor anything strictly analogous to 
material force, which would obviously be inconsis- 
tent with the nature of mind ; but, so far as we can 
perceive, such divine influence is, and can be, only 
the application of that mental force which is lodged 
in motives. God influences by setting motives be- 
fore us. If difficulties are to be surmounted, he sets 
before us motives which are fitted to increase our 
courage ; if threatening dangers are in our way, he 
sets before us motives which are adapted to excite 
our fears ; and in the vast field of human purpose 
and action, he is at no loss for appropriate sugges- 
tions and appliances suited to every possible occa- 
sion. 

It is proper to make the remark at this point, 
that God, in operating upon man by means of mo- 
tives, never violates his freedom. Man is not merely 
an existence but a moral and accountable being; 



DIVINE INFLUENCES. 23 1 

and freedom, placed beyond the reach of violation, is 
one of the attributes which constitutes him a 
man. 

4. — It is not necessary for us, however, to pursue 
the subject largely in this direction. The great 
topic before us, that of the absolute and unchangea- 
ble religion and what is included in it, renders it 
more important to affirm the fact than the manner 
of the fact ; to say what is rather than how it is. In 
saying, therefore, that there are and must be Divine 
Influences, God operating upon man and man the 
subject of the divine operation, we say that which 
is affirmed by human experience. And human ex- 
perience, considered in the different aspects in which 
it presents itself, includes the testimony both of 
feeling and reason. Eternal and unchangeable 
truth, when existing within the sphere of humanity 
and having relation to humanity, is always verified 
by human intuition. Intuitional reason affirms the 
influences of God. The existence of such divine in 
fluence is not identical with its affirmation ; but the 
affirmation is the out-birth and the revelation of the 
existence. And it may further be said, that the 
affirmation brings the great fact within the range 
of one of the forms of human experience ; and ena- 
bles us to recognize it, to speak of it, and to rejoice 
in it. 



232 ABSOL UTE RELIGION. 

5. — And this is not all. The existence of Di- 
vine Influence upon the mind is verified also by that 
form of experience which we call feeling. How 
common it is for men to say, with considerable vari- 
ety of expression, that God is near them or that He 
impresses them or that he is within them. Men af- 
firm the thing, not merely because it is intuitionally 
perceived, on the ground that it is because it cannot 
be otherwise, but because they feel it to be so. 
The emotions or sentiments have a voice as well as 
the perceptions ; and although the utterance is dif- 
ferent in form, it is the same in meaning. The his- 
tory of the churches, the history of individuals, the 
testimony which is given by persons in all situations, 
from the highest to the lowest, is in harmony with 
this statement, that divine influences are experienced 
and recognized in the inward feeling. 

6. — In a recently published work on Mental 
Philosophy, I have referred to the doctrine of divine 
influences in the following terms ; with the intro- 
duction of which here, I leave the subject, which is 
one of great practical importance to the reflections 
of the reader. 

The susceptibility of inspiration from higher 
sources is not merely, as some may perhaps suppose, 
a theological dogmatism, but is one of the great and 



DIVINE INFLUENCES. 



233 



precious facts of humanity. God never ignores the 
sublime truth of his universal Fatherhood, and has 
never released his connection with any of the tribes 
of men. He utters his voice everywhere. Homer, 
Plato, Euripides, Cicero, Livy and Plutarch, as well 
as the long record of those whose inspirational his- 
tory has given lustre and power to the unequalled 
pages of the Bible, have recognized the fact, that 
man in the weaknesses and ignorance incidental to 
his finite nature, is susceptible of strength and guid- 
ance from the Infinite. 

But these results are reached through law. The 
conditions of inspirational receptivity, at least those 
which are leading and indispensable, are three. 
First, Faith in this great fact, that there is thus an 
open door of communication between God and man ; 
second, a sincere desire that God, who never violates 
our freedom, will by means of his inspirational influ- 
ences come into communication with us ; and third, 
a freedom from all biases and prejudices of self-will, 
— in other words, unselfishness. Under such cir- 
cumstances, the human mind in virtue of the un- 
changeable laws of its being, is susceptible of being 
reached, instructed, and guided. Nothing is more 
important to man than such guidance. And the 
mental susceptibility (not exclusively, but much 



234 



ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 



more than some other of our mental powers,) which 
is open to divine influences, and which turns to 
catch the inspirational suggestions of God, is the 
Intuitional power. 



CHAPTER XXVII. 

Explanation of existing practical Methods of 

Teaching. 

I. — If the Christian religion, it will be said by- 
some, has thus a philosophical basis and is in fact 
the absolute and eternal religion, why should it not 
in the first instance, and always, be presented in that 
light, instead of being presented and pressed upon 
men in the way in which it commonly is. In other 
words, admitting that the Gospel is a philosophy, in 
the sense of having a philosophical and permanent 
foundation, it is objected, that it is not proclaimed 
and preached as a philosophy. And it is intimated 
and urged in relation to the method of teaching it, 
that it ought to be otherwise than it is. 

2. — The answer to this objection is this. There 
is. a great difference between philosophy, whether it 
be the philosophy of religion or any other form of 
philosophy, in itself considered, and in the essential- 
ness of its own nature, and the mode or manner of 
teaching such philosophy to those who have hith- 



236 ' ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

erto not received it. The truth is always the same ; 
and philosophy, when we discriminate between the 
semblance and the substance, can never be a varia- 
tion from the truth ; but the capacity of receiving 
the truth in all its length and breadth is not always 
the same. There is a great difference in this re- 
spect ; and the method of teaching, if it be a true 
and available method, will have relation not only to 
the thing taught, but to the present condition and 
the capacity of receiving on the part of those to 
whom instruction is to be communicated. The ge- 
ometries of Euclid and Legendre and the physical 
philosophy of Newton, at least in its mathematical 
principles, are the eternal truth ; they stand the 
same from age to age ; but the method of teaching, 
including the times and manner of teaching, is not 
identical with the thing taught ; and it is well 
known, that we do not teach geometries and other 
forms of the higher mathematics to children, be- 
cause there are other things more fitted to their yet 
weak and undeveloped capacity, and which may be 
considered as preparatory to the reception of the 
higher and more abstruse forms of truth. 

3. — And somewhat in accordance with this view, 
the preacher who has God for his guide in the in- 
structions he gives, will first address men in accor- 
dance with the facts in the case, namely, as being in 



EXISTING METHODS OF TEACHING. 



237 



the first form of life, or that form which we have de- 
nominated self-hood, and as being the subjects of 
all those errors and sins, which must necessarily re- 
sult from a continuance of that form of life, to the 
rejection of the light and truth of a higher form of 
life. In other words, the first object of the true 
preacher, taking men as he finds them, in the posses- 
sion not only of an outward written law, but of a 
law written upon the heart and yet living in the 
violation of that law, will be to convince them of sin. 
And having secured this, the second object, other- 
wise they would be left in the condition of misery 
which always results from a consciousness of sin, will 
be to disclose to them the possibility and the 
method of forgiveness. And therefore he points 
the sinner to Jesus ; in other words to God " mani- 
fest in the flesh ;" to God brought within the limits 
of humanity and revealed in his essential nature, 
and earnestly desiring the return of sinners to Him- 
self. 

4. — But this view of God revealed to man in the 
infinitude of his love, of God clothed in humanity 
and in humanity suffering upon the Cross, will be 
of no avail (such are the laws of the mind that it is 
not possible that it should be of any avail,) without 
faith or belief. And hence it is, that the preacher 
of the Gospel who is divinely guided, having first 



238 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

pressed the fact of sin, is led now to press with 
equal earnestness the matter of faith. If the sinner 
fully believes in God as a God of forgiveness and 
love, which he is enabled to do only by directing 
his thoughts to the great and wonderful facts, which 
make up the history of the incarnation and the 
Cross, then the misery attendant upon his trans- 
gression passes away ; and so far as forgiveness is 
concerned, he becomes reconciled to God. 

5. — And then, without undertaking to narrate 
minutely all the steps in the process, the question 
arises in the mind of the reconciled offender, how is 
it possible for me to be kept in the right path in 
the future. And accordingly the preacher, pursu- 
ing the true logical method by harmonizing his 
instructions with the condition and wants and re- 
ceptivity of the sinner, reminds him again of the 
universality of the law, — a law not only extending 
to all existences, but necessary and eternal and uni- 
versal in its obligations, — and teaches him, that its 
claims can be met only in one way, namely, by 
placing his freedom and power of will, — not annul- 
ling them but freely placing them, in the keeping 
and guidance of the divine will ; and thus virtually 
and practically, and yet with no loss of his own per- 
sonality and freedom, making himself one with God. 

6. — It is only when the mind is brought to this 



EXISTING METHODS OF TEACHING. 239 

position that it learns, (and it learns it then from its 
own inward experience,) that the Christian religion, 
as full of wisdom as it is of mercy and love, is the 
true and the only Absolute Religion. 

And it may be added here, that it is important 
for various reasons to remember, that the path of 
religious knowledge, when it aims at the foundation 
of things, is in this direction, and can be found no- 
where else. Obey and learn. Be ye followers of 
Christ, that ye may know the truths of Christ. 
Open thine eye to the light, that thou may- 
est see the things that the light reveals. When 
the soul has experimentally gone through with the 
spiritual processes, which the unchangeable truth re- 
quires, it will be found that this experimental knowl- 
edge will reveal and establish, beyond the power of 
any argument antecedent to such experience, not 
only the truth itself, but the immovable rock of its 
eternal foundation. 

7. — Go on, then, preachers of the Gospel and all 
who labor for the extension of the truth, surrounded 
as you are by those who are in ways of darkness and 
error, and proclaim to them their sin in order that 
they may be convinced of sin. Proclaim to them 
repentance, which includes not only a knowledge of 
sin, but sorrow for sin, and a change from sin. And 
as all sin, whatever its specific form, is, in its rela- 



240 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

tions and ultimate results, a sin against God ; pro- 
claim God, not in the first instance in the universality 
and incomprehensibleness of his existence, but God 
" manifested in Christ " and thus brought into the 
intimacy of human relations, as ready and will- 
ing to forgive. Proclaim not only the fact and free- 
ness of this great forgiveness, but also and with all 
the holy earnestness which is appropriate to your 
divine ministry, the fact of simple faith, as the only- 
possible means by which such forgiveness can be 
practically recognized and made available as a prin- 
ciple of renovation to the soul. Proclaim and show 
the necessity of the constant presence and in-dwell- 
ing of the Spirit of God. Proclaim the absolute sur- 
render of the human will to the divine will, as neces- 
sary to continuous and universal obedience and to 
the removal of all obstacles to the operation of God's 
spirit. Proclaim union with God, even as Christ and 
God are one, as the great practical and unchange- 
able result of divine teachings when fully received 
and realized. 

And thus shall it be seen and known, when the 
soul has ascended as it were after the manner of 
Jacob's ladder by successive steps, to the mount of 
angelic vision, that the great plan of salvation which 
annihilates sin by a love that has its expression in 
letters of blood, and which attracts and consolidates 



EXISTING METHODS OF TEACHING. 24 1 

human freedom with the harmonies of the univer- 
sal will, is not a mere dogmatism, but ascending far 
beyond and above the contingencies of time and 
place, is absolute, universal and eternal. 
11 



CHAPTER XXVIII. 

Contrasted Views of the Selfish and Essential Life. 

The world is man, or rather is humanity. And 
man is not a man except in virtue of possessing in 
himself what may be called a motive power. Such a 
power, — such an innate motivity, — is a necessity, 
(that is to say, a necessary or indispensable condi- 
tion) of the existence of all intelligent and active 
beings. This is undoubtedly one of the affirmations 
of man's intuitive intellect, — of the mind in its sug- 
gestive or spontaneous action ; an affirmation which 
utters itself in all men's hearts, and which therefore 
carries with it an universal consent. And so far 
philosophy harmonizes with religion. Man lives 
because he has power to live ; and the nature of his 
life will be according to the nature of that power. 

If we look at man's history from this point of 
view, we shall get a glimpse of the outlines of suc- 
cessive dispensations. In what is often called his 
natural state, man finds that internal and impulsive 
energy which constitutes the soul's life, — or at least 



VIEWS OF SELFISH AND ESSENTIAL LIFE. 



243 



this is generally and almost universally the case, — 
in the attractions of sensual pleasure, in the obstina- 
cies of pride, in the aspirations of ambition, in the 
hostilities of revenge, and in the ever-grasping de- 
sire of possession and accumulation. He is born 
into the finite ; — and his first idea is, (and it could 
not well be otherwise,) to live in the finite; — that is 
to say, to live for himself. He is his own world. 
In that world he lives ; and from it he lives ; and 
his object is not to diminish it by imparting to oth- 
ers, but on the contrary, though at the expense of 
jealousy and strife, to increase and strengthen it by 
adding whatever he can. And as society cannot be 
separated from the units which compose it, there- 
fore the man individual is the precise representa- 
tive, the type or form, of the man social. And 
therefore the leading characteristic of the first dis- 
pensation is SELFISM. And selfism is necessarily 
antagonism. He who lives to himself, does not 
live to others ; and not living to others as he lives 
to himself, and for himself, he is necessarily separat- 
ed from them in a greater or less degree, and be- 
comes antagonistical. Everywhere there is distrust, 
jealousy, pride, anger, lust, revenge, cruelty, and 
every evil thing which imagination can conceive. 
This is man's first development, the first historical 
fact which the early records of every nation and peo- 



244 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

pie distinctly declare. This is what is read in the 
histories of the savage tribes of North America.* 

This is what is read, if we look deeply into the 
motives of the actors, in the Homeric poems, and in 
the historical fragments and the traditions, as we 
find them in Niebuhr, which give us a view of the 
early states of Italy. This is the sad and humiliat- 
ing story, which I have myself seen and read, as it 
has stood through long generations, sculptured in 
the walls of the enduring temples of Thebes. Such 
is the historical truth that has been dug up also 
from the buried cities of the Tigris and the Euphra- 
tes. 

The nations which existed antecedent to the 
time of Moses, and in the regions through which he 
led the Hebrews, are illustrations of this statement ; 
— the Amalekites, the Moabites, the Ammonites, 
and also the cities, tribes, and states which inhabit- 
ed Palestine, and the Philistine country, and the an- 
cient Phoenicia. 

This first dispensation, which we will here call 
the dispensation of selfism, was modified, in the 
course of time and in some respects elevated, by a 
high civilization. It was the result of selfishness, 

* Numberless volumes might be referred to. Perhaps there is 
none more terribly instructive than the recently published Life of 
Beckwith. 



SIE WS OF SELFISH AND ESSENTIAL LIFE. 



245 



directing its agriculture and its commerce to the 
one great object of accumulation, that it should ac- 
quire wealth. And wealth in its turn brought leis- 
ure, luxury, a false refinement, and the polite arts. 
But nothing was altered in its essential nature. 
Selfishness was at the root. Selfishness was at the 
heart. Selfishness was everywhere. Refinement 
and art threw around it some semblance of beauty ; 
but it was only the beauty of the sculptured monu- 
ment, which conceals the death and corruption be- 
neath it. Thus Tyre and Sidon, and Nineveh and 
Babylon, and Memphis and Thebes, and Athens 
and Rome, with all their wealth and arts, were es- 
sentially under the same condemnation with the 
corrupt and degraded cities and nations which had 
perished before them. 

There are and can be only two essential or real 
dispensations, having a definite and fixed character ; 
— that which has its centre and its power of life in 
the individual or the limited, and that which has its 
centre in God or the universal. The dispensation 
of external law, which is incidental to the first, is 
not an essential, but an accessory dispensation; — 
which, however, has its place, its history, and its 
value. Although in the progressive development of 
existences, it was necessary that the attribute of free- 
dom should be given to man, — a real and not merely 



246 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

an apparent freedom, — yet the Divine Goodness 
could not allow, and the rights of freedom could not 
justly claim, that it should be permitted to men to 
do injury to others. In other words, although their 
freedom involved the fact or rather the possibility of 
their doing injustice, yet it would be right in God, 
and would be incumbent upon Him, to restrict all 
such unjust tendencies by a dispensation of law and 
of the penalties of law. Now the freedom of self- 
ishness is the freedom of destruction. 

And the world, with freedom for its opportunity 
and selfishness for its motive power, became a great 
slaughter-house, — an Aceldama, — so much so that a 
dispensation of external law, marking in many cases 
the precise boundaries between right and wrong, be- 
came a great necessity. The same love which 
granted freedom, imposed law ; in order that free- 
dom might not degenerate into license and ruin. 
And hence came that marked fact in the world's 
history, — the legal or Sinai dispensation ; — a dispen- 
sation which is not antagonistical to freedom, but 
only to freedom degenerating into license. The 
central expression of law, in its restriction of man's 
destructive selfishness, was at Mount Sinai. Exter- 
nal law is always terrible, because it is always antag- 
onistical. It stands with a drawn sword ; — it holds in 
its hand a flame of fire. And therefore the place 



VIE WS OF SELFISH AND ESSENTIAL LIFE. 247 

and the circumstances of its announcement were 
well adapted to what Avas announced ; — to a people 
who were prepared for it by experience and instruc- 
tion, and who were selected as the medium through 
which it was to be communicated to others ; — in a 
" waste howling wilderness," their tents spread upon 
the sand, with rocks and mountains rising all around 
them ; amid blackness, and storms, and thunder. 
Simultaneously and sympathetically, throughout the 
world, as we may well suppose, (for God's heart is 
one heart, and God's people are one people, and 
what he does for one he does for all,) the law en- 
graven distinctly on the Sinai tables, was engraven 
also, (with various degrees perhaps of distinctness, 
corresponding to their privileges and lights) upon the 
tables of the human soul. The universe is a whole 
■ — the head inseparable from the foot, — and nothing 
which is great and essential can take place in one 
heart, without reaching and affecting sympathetically 
all the others. The thunder of Sinai echoed through 
the" world ; because it was the voice of that God 
who is the life of humanity. Everywhere by means 
of an increased light opened in the conscience, and 
by means of moral teachers raised up in different 
lands, were the sentiments of justice developed in 
opposition to selfishness ; and the prevalence of vio- 
lence and cruelty was in a degree checked. And 



248 AB SOL UTE RELIGION. ' 

hence it is said by the apostle Paul, that the heathen 
to whom the Sinai law was not in the first instance 
expressly communicated, but who nevertheless re- 
ceived something of its substance, by means of those 
interior and magnetic currents which everywhere 
connect man with humanity, were " a law to them- 
selves, which show the work (or working) of the law 
written upon their hearts." 

But the same Apostle, — a man who had both 
great natural and great inspired light, says in another 
place, that the law " makes nothing perfect." And 
the reason is, because the law is not a life but a re- 
striction ; not a power but a chain. It makes noth- 
ing perfect, though it may be true that it shuts up 
and limits the downward progress of imperfection. 
The law, however, may be of great value, because 
if it does not give life, it may yet prevent ruin. 
And if the legal dispensation is incidental to the 
first or selfish dispensation, it is also transitional to 
the last dispensation or the dispensation of univer- 
sal love. And hence, it is that the same Apostle 
says, that the law, which is the same as the legal 
dispensation, is the schoolmaster, which brings us 
to Christ. And there is great truth in this, even 
when examined by the light of mere human reason. 
The pervertedly natural or selfish man sees things 
from the light of his own selfish centre. His desire 



VIE IV S OF SELFISH AND ESSENTIAL LIFE. 



249 



to include everything in himself is so strong, that it 
seems to him to be "right. He is, as the Scriptures 
represent him, blind. And God in his goodness has 
placed him under law, that he might not destroy 
himself, and that he might not destroy others. But 
this is not all. The same law which preserves him 
in his blindness from these injurious results, is also a 
teacher. It puts him in a new and effective school. 
It opens the eyes of his understanding. It is by 
means of the external law, operating through the 
inward law of the conscience, that he sees where he 
is, and what he has done, and where he is going. 
Under the law he is still a selfish man ; but he is a 
restrained or regulated selfish man. The legal dis- 
pensation is transitional, it gives light ; it is mixed 
in its* results ; it is a necessity ; but still it is true, as the 
Apostle says, that it completes nothing ; it u makes 
nothing perfect." The light or knowledge which it 
gives is the revelation of the utter deformity and in- 
sufficiency of the first or selfish dispensation. It also 
gives light in the other direction, by indicating 
though imperfectly, the character of that other dis- 
pensation which is to take its place. 

Let us look again at the expression of Paul, that 
the law or legal dispensation is a schoolmaster or 
teacher, which is to bring us to Christ. And here 
the first question is, who is Christ, or what is 



250 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

Christ? To the ancient patriarchs and prophets 
Christ was the man who was to come. To the dis- 
ciples and apostles at a later period, Christ was the 
man who did come. To those who close their eye 
to the form in order to be more receptive of the 
substance, Christ is not alone the Christ-man but 
the Christ-spirit. And the Christ-spirit embodied 
in one word is love. It seeks not the good of one 
merely, but of all. 

To seek the outward Christ is well, but to stop 
there is not well. The kingdom of God is within 
you. I speak from my own experience. I wanted 
Christ in the form. I wished to take him by the 
hand, and like the unbelieving Thomas of earlier 
days, to see the prints of the nails and to thrust my 
hand into his side. But he would not thus be seen 
by me. But I hear a voice, and it says, " here I 
am ; " and it says again, " I am He." It is thine 
inward eye that shall see me ; thine inward ear that 
shall hear me. 

And I said, Lord, how can this be. And he an- 
swered it was thus I told my disciples, " I am with 
you always even to the end of the world." No 
longer look for me in the outward form, and thou 
shalt find me in the inward spirit. The form is lim- 
ited, and belongs to one. The spirit is universal, 
and belongs to all. I am not with one of my disci- 



VIEWS OF SELFISH AND ESSENTIAL LIFE. 25 I 

pies only, but with all ; — and in all places and in all 
time, I yet live and am still a channel of the truth 
to all who are ready to receive it. Ye are the re- 
cipients ; I am the giver of that which ye receive. 
Ye are the form ; I am the substance. The forms 
are many ; but the substance is one. If I were 
present in a personal form, as I was once, and con- 
tinued to be present in such a form, I should be 
limited, and should be present to one or at most to 
a few. In my earthly form I was intimate with my 
twelve disciples, and with Lazarus and with Mary 
and Martha, and a few women from Galilee. But 
now I belong to humanity. Oh my Father, all 
mine are thine ; and thine are mine. Oh men, ye 
are the form ; I am the substance. If ye need me 
and seek me in the form ; then seek me and find me 
in yourself. 

It is thus we reach the great distinction between 
the first or legal dispensation and the second dispen- 
sation, the incarnation of Christ, or, in other words 
of that love which is the fulfilling of the Law. The 
time is hastening, when the true Christ-spirit will 
become incarnated in multitudes who will wa.lk the 
earth ; each a John, a Mary, each bearing his own 
name, and filling his own place, but each a member 
of that holy family of which Jesus Christ the Son of 
Mary and the Son of God is the Elder Brother. 



252 ' ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

When the impersonal Christ is born into the world 
in the fulness of his nature, the rights and sacred- 
ness of woman who is the virgin mother will be un- 
derstood and acknowledged. The incipient sign 
having relation to woman's position has already 
been given. Without woman, without the aid of 
the sympathies which are connatural to her affec- 
tionate nature, He could not and cannot be born 
into the world. Born of woman once he is born of 
woman forever. The truth of Christ dying for us 
without the other great truth of Christ living in us. 
leaves man out of the sphere of the Divine Unity, 
and in a state of perpetual orphanage. 

In giving utterance to the truths and principles 
which are now inspired within us, and which indi- 
cate our present position and purposes, we lay no 
bonds upon the future ; — we do not attempt with 
audacious hands to steady the divine Ark by plac- 
ing chains upon the endless unfoldings of unlimited 
Intelligence and Love; — but on the contrary think 
it important to proclaim distinctly, and as a thing 
which involves man's highest happiness, that we be- 
lieve in light added to light, in truth added to truth, 
appropriate to each added moment of time, to each 
added variation of circumstances, and to each as- 
cending step in the soul's unlimited progressional 
being. 



CHAPTER XXIX. 

Mediatorialism as a universal and practical Principle. 

I. — In the posthumous work of Frederic Sec- 
ond of Prussia, entitled, " The History of my own 
Times," is the following passage. After stating 
that Locke and Bayle had in part loosened and torn 
asunder the bandages of error, he adds: "Other 
sages also have appeared ; such as Fontenelle and 
Voltaire in France ; the celebrated Thomasius in 
Germany; Hobbes, Collins, Shaftesbury, and Bol- 
ingbroke in England. These great men and their 
disciples have given religion a mortal blow." Such, 
in the time of Frederic the Great, as he is com- 
monly designated, was the opinion of many. And 
indeed it is the opinion of many to this day, that 
philosophy is antagonistical to religion ; that reli- 
gion is destitute of a philosophic basis; and that its 
great and saving truths are likely to be unsettled 
and overthrown by the repeated and heavy assaults 
which philosophy makes upon them. So far from 
accepting such an opinion, we cannot doubt that 



254 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

philosophic inquiries, conducted with patience and 
candor, will ultimately show a very different result; 
and that philosophy, in the completion and just ex- 
ercise of its own accepted cognitive methods, will 
be found standing strongly in the explanation and 
defence of religion, and not in antagonism to it. If 
it is admitted that religion, in being subjected to a 
philosophical analysis, is not explainable by the 
speculations of Hobbes and Condillac and of others 
of the so-called Materialistic School, some of whom 
are mentioned by the Prussian king ; and if its prob- 
lems are beyond the mastery of Fichte and Schell- 
ing and Hegel of a later day, and others who are 
their disciples or opposers, yet in the progress of 
time and in the necessary combination of the Sen- 
suous and Super-sensuous philosophical Schools, 
and with the added light which is gently breaking 
from above in the profound teachings of Christ in 
the soul, the depths of religion, except so far as 
they are necessarily beyond the reach of finite fac- 
ulties, will at last be fathomed, and its mysteries ex- 
plained and made clear. 

2. — The subject of this chapter is Mediatorialism ; 
a subject which cannot be mentioned without at 
once leading our thoughts to Christ as the embodi- 
ment of the mediatorial principle. Mediatorialism 
is the name of the principle ; Mediator is the name 



MEDIA TORI A II SM. 2 $ 5 

of the person or being mediating. And as media- 
torship can exist practically and personally, only on 
the basis of a mediatorial principle or truth antece- 
dently existing, the whole subject comes within the 
sphere and the recognitions of philosophy. In 
other words it is a part of the Absolute Religion. 

It is conceded to the claims of philosophy, that 
one of its functions is to deal with principles, in dis- 
tinction from forms and manifestations ; including 
the relation of principles, whatever they may be, to 
their results. Philosophy, in the higher and diviner 
sense, which is the only true sense, so far from be- 
ing at war with the massive and truly glorious dog- 
matisms of Christianity, shows the divinity of the 
wisdom which gives them their dogmatic form and 
place ; and also defends them in the eternity and 
necessity of their subjective foundations. 

3. — This subject presents itself in various as- 
pects. Mediatorialism in its results is giving. To 
give, implies gifts in possession and as there is but 
one original source or fountain of such gifts, to give 
is primarily and eminently the prerogative of God. 
To give, inasmuch as God would not be God with- 
out giving, is an eternal Truth ; the spirit of giving 
is the eternal Life ; and mediatorialism, which is 
based upon the fact of innumerable diversities in- 
volving innumerable wants, is the Way, by means 



256 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

of which the Life carries the Truth into effect. It 
is in this sense that Christ is called the Way, as 
well as the Truth and the Life. Standing in the 
relation of God " manifested in the flesh " or the 
God-man, and thus harmonizing mentally and physi- 
cally with the attributes of the race, he stands in the 
position of the distributive channel of the measure- 
less infinitudes of God into the finite measurements 
of all subordinate existences. Mediatorialism is an 
unalterable law. The Cross as a principle and medi- 
atorialism as a principle, though the latter may be 
regarded as logically subsequent in time, and in 
some sense subordinate in position, are connected 
together in close and inseparable relationship as 
means and end. The goods of the universe, which 
exist necessarily in God as their source or fountain 
are, by the law of the Cross, to be distributed, and 
to manifest themselves in their appropriate forms 
and results, in all degrees of existence from the 
highest to the lowest. 

4. — There are some things which are ultimate, 
and one is, that the infinitudes of God could not by 
any conceivable possibility find their way into the 
possession of finite beings, except by methods 
which recognize and harmonize with the fact of 
their finiteness. But the way from one to the other 
is founded in the nature of things, and is one of the 



MEDIA TORIALISM. 



257 



products of " eternal generation ; " grand, mysteri- 
ous, intuitionally as well as scripturally revealed, and 
banishing forever all those doubts which would sep- 
arate God from his children. God the Absolute and 
God manifested in the finite form, and manifested in 
part for this very purpose, are mediatorially united 
in Christ, and in a way so wonderful, that He lays 
one hand on the great Infinitude of existence, and 
with the other touches the poorest and lowest of 
human beings ; and brings them into each other's 
presence ; and linking the last with the first, and 
the highest with the lowest, harmonizes the diversi- 
ties of the universe. 

5. — What was true of Christ, with the limitations 
which naturally suggest themselves in connection 
with his special position and character, is true of his 
people. As was said of Christ, so it can be said of 
the true follower of Christ, " virtue goes out of 
him." On the supposition that the true Life power 
is in him, which is of course involved in the fact of 
his being a true Christian, it will always be found, 
that he is a channel, a method of communication, a 
mediatorial gateway ; and that he is so, not by a 
temporary and arbitrary arrangement, but by the 
constitution of things and the divine necessities of 
the case. So that men cannot look upon him with- 
out being blessed with the divine light which beams 



258 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

from his countenance ; and they cannot talk with 
him without feeling almost sensibly the divinely 
inspirational weight of his words. 

6. — There is one attribute of the mediatorial 
principle, which is worthy of special notice ; it is the 
attribute or law of increase. The intuitional inspi- 
rations of Christ have announced this law in re- 
markable words; not the less striking perhaps, 
because they are negative as well as affirmative in 
the form : " He that hath, to him shall be given ; 
and from him that hath not, shall be taken even 
that which he hath." He who is not a true subject 
of mediatorial life, in not accepting the great law of 
instrumentality in goodness, cannot grow ; but is 
deprived of the gifts, whatever they may be, which 
he already has. And the law of increase corre- 
sponds to this result ; the increase in the power or 
capacity of the principle itself being greater or less, 
in proportion to the beneficial results attending its 
own practical exercise. He who does good, and 
every time that he exercises goodness, and in the 
degree that he does good, grows in the power of 
doing good, so that the benevolent activity of the 
soul is practically and resultingly the growth of the 
soul. 

7. — How delightful is the thought, that it is our 
privilege not only to be mediators, but to grow as 



MEDIA TORI A LI SM. 259 

mediators ; not only to be channels of good to others, 
but by a fixed and ultimate law to become wider and 
deeper as channels ; not merely to be the little rivu- 
lets that flow on with small results, but to swell into 
mighty rivers that nourish cities and nations, and 
float the commerce of the world. 

8. — Such is the brief outline of the doctrine of 
mediatorship when, without any disrespect to the 
value of the dogmatical expression, it is subjected, 
in accordance with the progressive demands of the 
age, to the inquiries of analytic thought and reason. 
And we do not see that anything is lost by it. The 
mediatorial principle is a permanent and universal 
one ; existing everywhere and under all possible 
varieties of circumstance. 

9. — Humanity, in the consciousness of its great 
needs, calls for the announcement of spiritual truths, 
which shall be practically carried out. Mediatorial- 
ism is one of them. What the world wants to-day, 
and what, with its " Macedonian cry," it calls for 
to-day, is mediators ; men who are trained in the 
self-denying school of the great mediatorial captain 
and leader ; men who, by the internal law of their 
being, are mediatorially alive. What but this great 
resource, can solve among other things the terrible 
social problems, which press upon our suffering face ? 
The heart trembles when, going below the surface 



260 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

of things, it everywhere beholds the social and moral 
volcano on which our present selfish society stands. 
The millions in our cities who are suffering in pov- 
erty and wrong and crime, are restlessly demanding 
the day of their redemption. There is no peace, 
but in justice. No justice but in the law of the 
Cross, which is practically useless, unless it is medi- 
atorially complemented and carried out. Mediato- 
rialism is Christ in action. The contest may be long 
and severe, but the benevolent principle of mediator- 
ship, which, in receiving good only to communicate 
it, hears all groans and wipes all tears, will gently 
draw out the deep and smouldering fires which lie 
around and beneath us, and prevent the threatening 
convulsions. 

10. — One of the results of the great principle of 
mediatorship is, that it associates us with angels. 
The mediatorial principle, in being a principle and 
not merely an event or incident, is not only eternal 
but universal. It is the law of men ; it is also the 
angelic law ; and is not more the true life of the 
earth than it is of the heavens. Angels, and all be- 
ings in the heavenly spheres, are the embodiments of 
mediatorial activity. The scriptures affirm it ; and 
if they did no,t, it could not be otherwise. It is of 
these high and holy beings it is said, that they are 
" all ministering spirits, sent forth to minister for 



MEDIA TORIALISM. 26 1 

them, who shall be heirs of salvation." So that it 
can be said in a true interior sense that, in becom- 
ing mediatorial, and in thus falling into the line of 
harmony with all good and useful activities whether 
above or below us, " ye are come unto Mount Sion 
and unto the city of the living God, and to an innu- 
merable company of angels." 



CHAPTER XXX. 

Explanation of Terms regarding the Essential Life, 

TRUE love which is known in the writings of the 
devout Mystics and Quietists under the denomina- 
tion of Pure Love, is the love of existence. In 
other words it is of the nature of true or pure love, 
and is that which constitutes what it is, to attach 
itself, not to the form of things, but to the essences 
of things. And what is perhaps equally important 
in the discrimination of its nature, it loves indepen- 
dently of forms or modes of existence; it seeks truly 
and earnestly the happiness of whatever is capable 
of happiness, whatever may be its character or the 
form of its existence. 

In the separation of that primary existence, 
which we denominate being from all its incidents 
and diversities of form and character, such being, in 
its essential nature, necessarily presents itself as a 
unit. And hence it is in loving the unit or oneness 
of being, we virtually and truly love all being. 



TERMS REGARDING ESSENTIAL LIFE. 263 

And accordingly it can be said, when man is 
born not transitionally, or in part, but in the true 
birth, he is then a " partaker of the Divine Nature/' 
He is in God, and God in him. Man must necessa- 
rily retain his individuality for the reason that the 
finite cannot be the Infinite. It is individualism, or 
finite personality living, breathing and acting in 
God. Let us illustrate the subject a little further in 
connection with a common remark, namely, that 
everything has its sphere of life. Trees and plants 
have their spheres. The lower animals have their 
sphere. And this remark is true of men, as it is of 
everything else. Man has his sphere. The will of 
man's perceptions and motives is necessarily bound- 
ed, in the first instance, by the limited will of his 
position. In his individual capacity he acts in his 
individual sphere. But the truth and perfection of 
his action is realized, when his action as an individ- 
ual and in his own sphere harmonizes with the truth, 
the motives and the holiness of the Universal Sphere, 
of which God is the centre. It is then that his 
sight becomes clear ; he sees with God's eye, he 
hears with God's ear. 

These views help us to explain certain expres- 
sions, which are found from time to time in writers. 
In the experience, for instance, of the state of Pure 
Love, the individual, who is the subject of this high 



264 'ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

and transforming experience, may be said, in a cer- 
tain sense, to be merged and mingled in that which 
is out of himself, and even to become" extinct'' and 
" lost " in God. Expressions of this kind, and among 
others the term " self-annihilation," are found not un- 
frequently in the writings of some devout Catholics ; 
nor are they wholly unknown in Protestant religious 
literature. But in using such terms, which are 
spiritually and profoundly significant, the literal 
meaning must be somewhat modified. It is not 
meant to be said of the person to whom such terms 
are applied, that he is extinct or lost, in the absolute 
sense of the expressions and in the matter of dis- 
tinct personality. He is not lost, is not " annihi- 
lated,'' in the fact of that actual self-consciousness, 
which constitutes him a distinct and responsible exis- 
tence; but only in separateness of interests and 
hopes ; in those reflex acts which turn the mind 
too much upon our own joys and purposes ; in 
everything which makes us forgetful of the wants 
and happiness of others, by incidentally seeking our- 
selves. Such an one, retaining his personality but 
expanding it without limitation, knows enough of 
himself as an individual to know that he is not his 
own, that his soul has become a living fountain which 
takes its rise from God, and flows out to all the 
boundless variety of existences. Names, sect, rank, 



TERMS REGARDING ESSENTIAL LIFE. 2 6$ 

party, color, become indistinct, and are comparatively 
lost in the one idea of Universal Brotherhood. 

io. — The man " born again " and fully complet- 
ed in the second birth, is not only humanitarian in 
the highest sense of that term, but is the holy or 
divine man. The man humanitarian is something 
more than the man individual. And the man di- 
vine is something more than the man humanitarian. 
The difference at each gradation not only exists as 
a difference, but it is great. Such a man, in the 
wide and resistless movement of the divine Spirit 
within him, not only transcends the restricted 
bounds of individualism, not only passes beyond the 
limits of kindred and country, but beyond those of 
humanity itself; and embraces not only the brother- 
hood of man but all existences, both those above 
him and those below him. Nothing but the bound- 
lessness of existence, which is ever developing itself, 
nothing but the boundlessness of benevolence, which 
is ever pouring happiness into existences, nothing 
but the Infinite of creation and the Infinite of love, 
nothing but God himself in the widest and noblest 
sense of that glorious term, can meet and satisfy his 
measureless sympathies. 

Holy Love, in being a perpetual life, is also a 
perpetual development ; — it never ceases its action. 
To cease to act, would be to cease to live. It is 

12 



266 ABSOL UTE RELIGION. 

not to be supposed, therefore, that God will love, 
for some definite length of time, which shall be the 
completion of some marked period or epoch ; — for 
instance, till the supposed destruction of the world 
by fire, or till the hypothetical day of the final 
Judgment, — and then having separated the wicked 
from the righteous will cease to love them. He 
loves them, and from the nature of the case, he 
must continue to love them. There is not a sinner 
in Hades or Hell, (which however is only another 
name for the darkness and discordancy of the lowest 
sphere of spiritual existences,) who is not sought 
after, and watched over. This is the great and glo- 
rious truth, which makes all heaven ring with joy, 
that God is God forever, and that He is Love for- 
ever ; although it may not follow, and it does not 
necessarily follow, that this love, unceasing though 
it be, will be accepted and be made available in the 
case of all those towards whom it is directed. That 
is one of the things which is to be left ; because it 
is one of the things which takes hold of the Eternal 
and the Infinite. If Love is absolute and unchange- 
able, freedom also, as an attribute of moral beings, 
is absolute and unchangeable. God himself, who in 
being the absolute truth, can never fail to respect 
the absolute truth, and will never coerce a sinner 
into heaven ; for that would only be placing him in 



TERMS REGARDING ESSENTIAL LITE. 2 6j 

a deeper Hell. This would be a violation of fixed 
and unchangeable truths and relations. It would 
be an impossibility. 

But in some other place, this amazing subject 
should be explained more fully; — with appropriate 
facts, arguments, and illustrations. Moral facts and 
relations are just as fixed and unchangeable as 
mathematical facts and relations. What we wish to 
say now is, that Love which is Life, under no con- 
tingencies whatever will ever cease to act. And 
although there is a great gulf between heaven and 
hell, it is true that " Christ, who preached to the 
spirits in prison," has mighty moral power by means 
of moral suggestions, and that place may be chang- 
ed by change of character. It is thus that Truth 
and goodness are reconciled ; but curiosity stands 
rebuked. It is a mark of a godlike finite mind to 
leave much to the Infinite mind without inquiry. 



CHAPTER XXXI. 

Evidences of the Existence of the Essential Life. 

I. — How shall it be known by others, or how shall 
we determine for ourselves, whether this element of 
a true and everlasting life is in us or not ? — an in- 
quiry so important, that it has called forth at various 
times such thoughtful works as that of Shepard of 
Cambridge on the Parable of the Virgins, Scougal's 
Life of God in the Soul of man, and President Ed- 
wards' Treatise on the Religious Affections. The 
great Teacher, who had the life in Himself, and who 
is the source of life to others, gives the answer to 
the question before us, in those simple but signifi- 
cant words : " By their fruits ye shall know them." 

2. — The mind of Christ, speaking after the man- 
ner of men, was not only constituted with a highly 
poetic tendency, as some modern critics have justly 
acknowledged, but was eminently thoughtful, and 
was by no means destitute of a philosophical ele- 
ment. And He gives one of the best evidences of 
this trait of character, and that he knew especially 



E VIDENCES OF ESSENTIAL LIFE. 2 6g 

how to deal with mental questions, in generally 
communicating his great doctrines, not in abstract 
statements, but in familiar illustrations, adapted to 
the mental development of those around him. Ac- 
quainted as he was with the most interior relation 
of things, he does not say to the multitude whom 
he addresses, " Every effect has its cause," or some- 
thing of that kind ; but says, in kindly sympathy 
with the feeble intellectualism of his uneducated 
hearers, " Men- do not gather grapes from thorns, 
nor figs from thistles." A beautiful illustration, set- 
ting clearly forth the great philosophical principle, 
that the character of the effect, whether good or 
evil, is necessarily, and by a law of being, a revela- 
tion of the nature of its cause. In knowing the re- 
sults, we know the causative principle ; in knowing 
the fruits, we know the vital force from which they 
spring. We feel at liberty therefore to affirm, that 
the good man, being what he is, does not do good 
from self-interested calculations; but on the princi- 
ple involved in Christ's illustration of the tree and 
its fruits, does good because he cannot do other- 
wise ; it being the law of a truly good and holy na- 
ture to do good. Such a man is in the true life : 
and may be said in a high and sacred sense to be a 
living man. " He that hath the Son," says the 
Apostle John, " hath life, and he that hath not the 



270 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

Son of God, hath not life." The living man is like 
a star, which shines because it is a star ; is like a 
fountain, which flows because it is a fountain ; is like 
a flower, which gives out its fragrance because it is 
a flower ; is like a tree, which bears fruit because it 
is a tree. In other words a living man in the high- 
er sense of the term, is, by the necessities of his na- 
ture a man of out-goings, of activities, of fruits or 
works ; having the practical working and manifesta- 
tion of his earthly career hung round with the flow- 
ers and the fruits of beneficence. 

3. — Such is the answer of Christ to the question 
before us ; and it is an answer which will bear the 
most thoughtful consideration. But it will perhaps 
be suggested here, that the evidence which is thus 
furnished, it being objective or outward, is evidence 
to others only, and not to the man himself. But it 
is to be remembered that, while the fruits are out- 
ward, the causative principle is inward. And in the 
correlation of things, felt and accepted in the uni- 
versal intuitions of men, they go together. The 
outward fruits, it is true, are matters of outward ob- 
servation ; but the outward fruits reveal the fact of 
the inward principle, which stands as the source or 
the motive of action, and then adjusting our affir- 
mations, not to the outward results, but the inward 
cause, we say at once on the basis of mental knowl- 



EVIDENCES OF ESSENTIAL LIFE. 



271 



edge, that the cause, revealed in the man's own 
breast, comes within the sphere of consciousness. 
The man therefore who is really in the outward 
truth, in the matter of good fruits or good doing, 
will know himself also to be in the inward or essen- 
tial truth, because his consciousness cannot testify 
to a falsehood. It is in accordance with this view, 
that it is said in the first Epistle of John of the be- 
liever in Christ, that he " hath the witness in him- 
self." And the Apostle Paul also, in the Epistle to 
the Romans asserts, that " the Spirit itself," who 
always harmonizes with the truth, " beareth witness 
with our spirit ; " in other words, concurrently tes- 
tifies, in such ways as are known to himself, to the 
affirmation of our own consciousness, " that we are 
the children of God." 

Such is the evidence in the case. The principles 
involved in it are scriptural, and at the same time 
are in accordance with human reason. They bear 
at least the seal and signature of the great Master. 
Practical good doing, involving as it does the " in- 
ward witness," is the true test of the life of God in 
the soul. 

But it is proper to add at this point, that the ac- 
tivity, resulting in good doing or good fruits, is not 
always in the same method or form, but is suscepti- 
ble of many diversities. It is apparently a fixed 



272 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

and permanent principle in the constitution of 
things, that every thing which exists finds some- 
where its correspondent or counterpart ; and accord- 
ingly that which is good, will be found to be sup- 
plemented with occasions of good ; and that which 
is evil, finds itself surrounded with occasions of evil, 
so that every living principle, attracting around its 
own vitalizing centre the occasions and opportuni- 
ties of its exercise, forms as it were a habitation for 
itself to dwell in. And yet it is true that the habi- 
tation, the surrounding framework and dwelling- 
place of occasions, is not always specifically the 
same ; but in the multitude of its facts and inci- 
dents, notwithstanding its fixed relations to its cen- 
tral attracting element, is exceedingly diversified. 
Nor is there any rule which can definitely ascertain 
and specify beforehand, what the precise nature of 
that diversity will be ; in other words, in what par 
ticular way each one will act out his inward life in 
its correspondent good or evil ; for it is one of those 
things, which, in taking hold of the immeasurable 
infinitude of facts and relations, necessarily lies hid- 
den in the depths of infinite wisdom. 

4. — While therefore it is necessary for each one 
to be good in order to fulfill his highest obligations, 
and to secure the highest happiness, it is not possi- 
ble for any one to say beforehand, precisely in what 



EVIDENCES OF ESSENTIAL LIFE. 



273 



way this goodness will manifest itself. And if 
we cannot beforehand lay down the law for our- 
selves in this matter, so, also, we cannot always ac- 
cept the law or rule of action from the opinion or 
dictates of others, who may be supposed to be 
equally ignorant. But having the life of goodness 
as something central and essential, we shall not di- 
rect its outflowing by means of arbitrary calcula- 
tions and adjustments ; shall not do this or that, 
shall not go in this or that direction in our own 
wills ; but shall rather find ourselves the quiet and 
almost unconscious subjects of its divine tendency, 
to move, and move only in God's time, in God's 
way, and in God's degree. And the result is, as 
God directs us and not man, and with all the knowl- 
edge which God alone possesses, that there are very 
numerous diversities ; and such as could not be 
safely originated or directed by mere human wis- 
dom. Hence it is that one good man will be a 
preacher at home ; another, with the same essential 
life in his soul, will be a missionary to the heathen. 
One, taking the direction of outward activity, will 
cry aloud and spare not, like Luther or Whitfield ; 
and another, by an interior leading equally divine, 
will worship God, after the manner of Penn or 
George Fox, in the temple of inward stillness. And 
such diversities, all springing from the same essen- 

T2* 



274 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

tial unity, will be all and equally pleasing to God. 
In all probability, there was much speculation in the 
earlier ages about that solitary and mysterious man, 
Thomas a Kempis ; and many perhaps thought he 
was an unprofitable Christian ; but God, neverthe- 
less, had a work for him to do, and was working in 
him ; and at last the fruitage of his solitary medita- 
tions- appeared in that well known and eminently 
spiritual work, the Imitation of Christ, on which the 
hungry souls of successive generations have fed. 

7. — And similar diversities of result will appear 
in things which are regarded as secular ; but which, 
in a true state of society, will be brought more fully 
and distinctly within the sphere of religion. The 
mathematical sciences, and those sciences which in- 
volve more or less a mathematical calculation as their 
basis, are often placed in the popular estimation, 
outside of the religious sphere ; at least in a great 
degree. And it is oftentimes plainly hinted, per- 
haps on account of their supposed closer connection 
with the head than the heart, that the mathematician 
and the philosopher in their solitary studies, might 
be more profitably employed in a prayer meeting. 
This may sometimes be the case. But it is no pre- 
sumption to say, as a general principle, that the re- 
ligious character of a man's work does not so much 
depend upon the place where he is, as upon his in- 



EVIDENCES OF ESSENTIAL LIFE. 27$ 

spiration ; does not turn so much upon the thing 
which he does, as upon the question whether God 
calls him to do it, and whether he acts from a true 
inward life. We do not find it stated of Sir Isaac 
Newton that he appeared much in public, especially 
on occasions of a religious nature ; and yet, remem- 
bering that God acts through a diversity of gifts and 
methods, we can not easily think of him in his silent 
and protracted inquiries, pursued for objects which 
he felt to be connected with the progress of the hu- 
man race, without almost consciously feeling, that the 
Spirit of God was with him, and was the true inspira- 
tion of his profound thoughts. His reply, when 
asked by some one in what way he arrived at his dis- 
coveries, was, that he " kept the subject constantly 
before him, and waited till the first dawning opened, 
slowly, by little and little, into a full and clear light." 
This is a statement of a condition of mind, at- 
tended as it was in the case of Newton with great 
unselfishness, simplicity, and lowliness of spirit, which 
is eminently favorable to the presence and opera- 
tions of the Spirit of God. And so of many other 
cases. A great Continent, for instance, was to be 
discovered ; lands and forests and mighty rivers, long 
hidden in darkness were to be brought to light ; and 
therefore it was that God, who had inspired great 
thoughts and aspirations in the mind of Columbus 



276 



ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 



thoughts and aspirations correspondent to the 
work to be done, did not send him to the convent 
of La Rabida to affiliate with the monks, and to 
become a member there, and to occupy his life in 
the prayers and services of a monastery ; but clothed 
him in the garb of a sailor, and sending him with 
his frail vessels from the port of Palos, required the 
fulfillment of his mission on the stormy waves of the 
ocean — a mission, secular as it was in its outward 
aspects, which had a close connection with God's 
providential plans, and with Christ's reign upon 
earth. 

8. — And so it is and ought to be everywhere. 
The diversities of practical religion are commen- 
surate with the diversities of practical life. Every- 
thing, which is fitting to be done, is fitting to be re- 
ligiously done ; and furthermore, it cannot by any 
possibility be done fittingly, unless it is done reli- 
giously. Religion is necessary in the pulpit and the 
prayer-meeting ; and it is equally necessary in direct- 
ing the plough of the husbandman, and in working 
with the tool of the mechanic. The hard hand of 
the sailor needs it, and the head of the philosopher 
cannot do without it. And there is a sense also, in 
which the beautiful saying of Milton may be accept- 
ed as a religious truth : 

They Tilso serve, who only stand and wait. 



EVIDENCES OF ESSENTIAL LIFE. 277 

9. — The tree is known by its fruits. And the 
evidence of a truly divine life, as Christ still more 
specifically teaches us, is found in good fruits. They 
may be diversified in form and flavor and other re- 
spects, but they must be good. And accordingly 
the question still remains to be answered : If the 
existence of a true inward life is known not from 
fruit alone, but from the additional and essential in- 
cident of their goodness, in what way or by what 
signs shall we ascertain the fact of such goodness ? 
The answer to this vital inquiry is to be found, not 
in the doubtful or the diluted doctrines of human 
philosophy, but in the soul-searching precepts and 
principles of Christ. Who can read the Sermon on 
the Mount, the Gospel and Epistles of John, the 
13th chapter of the First Epistle to the Corinthians, 
and other like portions of the New Testament, es- 
pecially with the commentary of the acts and doings 
of Christ himself, without a full conviction, that the 
fruitage which grew in the heart and life of Christ, is 
destined to be born, and is required to be born, in 
the hearts and lives of his followers ? We answer 
therefore in general terms, and without going fully 
into this particular topic at present, that a life of 
good fruits, ascertained and known to be such, is, 
and must be a true Christ life. And some of the 
marks or characteristics of the life of Christ in the 



278 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

soul, if we rightly understand the Scriptures which 
have been referred to, are, first, it is necessarily an- 
tagonistical to evil ; second, it ultimately and always 
conquers in its contest with evil ; third, it carries on 
its victorious contest not with " carnal weapons," but 
on entirely new principles. It conquers jealousy, 
not by becoming jealous itself, but by being without 
jealousy. It conquers envy, not by being envious 
itself, but by being without envy. It conquers 
pride and ambition, not by seeking the high places 
of earthly power, but by taking a low place, and by 
becoming the servant of all. It conquers hatred, 
not by hating and smiting in return, but by pity and 
love. It conquers reviling and cursing, not by ut- 
terances, which are like them in bitterness, but by 
patience, and by kind words and blessings. It 
bleeds and dies upon the cross, but it bursts the 
bars of the tomb, and ascends to heaven. Its ar- 
mory is found in the essentiality and the mighty 
energy of its own life of Love ; and it is entitled to 
its place of victor, not only by the skill and power 
of Love as the true and mighty " sword of the 
Spirit," but by the unchangeable truth and the celes- 
tial ascendancy of its position. 

Standing in the pure and high places, and in the 
power of God himself, it looks down with calmness 
upon the various forms of personal hostility, to 



EVIDENCES OF ESSENTIAL LIFE. 



2/9 



which it is oftentimes subject. It is true that under 
such circumstances of ingratitude, opposition, and 
hostility, love is very apt to take the form of pity ; 
but love, in being pity adopts a modification of its 
action, without ceasing to be love. 



CHAPTER XXXII. 

The Essential Life Reaches to all Existences. 

The Essential Life, though limited in its sphere 
of action, is the same in man as it is in God. It may 
bear different names ; it may be called Life, or Es- 
sential Life, or Eternal Life, or God's Life, or the 
Life of God in the soul of man, or Love, or Pure Love, 
or Holy Love, or Perfect Love, or Holiness, or the 
Holy Spirit, or the Holy Ghost, or the Christ 
Spirit, or the Inward Christ, or Christ in the 
Soul, whatever may be the designation it bears, it is 
always -the same in the essentiality of its nature ; 
the same in the beginning, the same now, and for- 
ever. It follows from this, that the soul, which is 
born into this true and essential life, a life which sees 
with the spirit, and which hears and understands with 
the heart, will tenderly recognize the presence and 
activity of this divinity of life, and will love it, in 
all things that exist. Hence it is, that Christ in the 
Soul, which is one of the beautiful names it bears, 
loves inanimate nature, loves trees and flowers. 



ESSENTIAL LIFE REACHES ALL EXISTENCES. 281 

" Behold the lilies of the field ; they toil not, neither 
do they spin ; and yet I say unto you, that Solomon 
in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these." 
Christ in the soul saw that glory. The outward eye, 
resting merely upon outward manifestations, saw only 
the outward forms ; saw the color and the flowing 
outline ; but Christ in the soul, which instinctively 
recognizes its own nature under all diversities, saw 
the Christ principle at work in the flower ; the eter- 
nal goodness and wisdom shining in the interior of 
the flower ; and its glory was greater than the glory 
of Solomon. God, who takes care of trees and 
flowers, takes care also and in a special sense of 
animals ; and a recognition of the rights of the 
lower animals and a true sympathy and love for 
them, is a part of the inward experience of those 
who have God in the soul. If any are disposed to 
regard such experiences as of little value in them- 
selves, or as unauthorized by the Scriptures, let 
them turn to the 104th Psalm, that grand outburst 
of God's love for animals ; and read there the feel- 
ings of the great throbbing Heart of the Universe, 
who planted the cedars of Lebanon for the nest of 
birds, the fir-tree for the house of the stork, and 
who spread the great ocean, not merely for naviga- 
tors' ships and the anchors and cables of commerce, 
but for the play-ground of the leviathan, and for 



282 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

creeping things innumerable both small and great. 
To the heart that inwardly understands and digests 
this wonderful poem, this great hymn of love, every 
sphere of life is, and must be sacred. 

There was a remarkable man who lived in Italy 
in the twelfth century ; a man so gifted in intellect 
and so devout in heart, and so abundant in labors, 
that he has left his impress on succeeding ages. It 
is related of this man, St. Francis of Assisi, that 
to him all nature was full of God ; and that his re- 
ligious consciousness, grounded in and quickened by 
the inward realizations of celestial love, was so ex- 
panded that it embraced every thing, animate and 
inanimate, men and animals. He believed, as all 
those who are in the same degree of celestial love 
are always likely to believe, that all the departments 
of nature were designed to be connected by a com- 
munity of life ; that the broken bonds which once 
united them are waiting for a restoration ; that 
man, with faith enough and love enough, shall once 
more control the winds and waves ; and that the 
lower animals, like the dove of Noah, and the ravens 
of Elijah, and the lions of the den of the Chaldean 
prophet, shall sympathize with his sorrows, and ad- 
minister to his necessities. Our doctrine is sup- 
ported abundantly by the Scriptures, as we believe, 
that there is something beyond the brotherhood of 



ESSENTIAL LIFE REACHES ALL EXISTENCES. 283 

humanity, namely, the brotherhood of life ; some- 
thing beyond the love of humanity, the wider and 
deeper love of everything that exists. And we ap- 
peal in support of it, to the personal history and the 
recorded convictions of many devout men in all 
ages. And we may go further and say, that the in- 
stincts of the human race, and the sympathies and 
aspirations of all great minds, especially those that 
kindle with the divine elements of poetic life, all 
point in the same direction. The poems of the 
early Greeks and Romans are full of this tendency. 
The poems of Cowper and Burns, of Wordsworth 
and Shakespeare, furnish us examples and proofs. 
The poem of Burns on the Wounded Hare was not 
a sentimental or hypocritical expression of grief; 
but had its birth in the heart, and was as deeply 
true to nature in one direction, as the sublime 
stanzas to Mary in Heaven are in another. Men 
and animals, sundered and rendered antagonistical, 
are nevertheless one family. And when the Life of 
God in the soul becomes on a wide scale, the inher- 
itance of a regenerated humanity, then all the lower 
forms of created nature, recognizing at once the re- 
lation of superiority and inferiority, will take their 
position in subordination ; and as there will be every- 
where a correlation and reciprocity, not only of 
forces but of interests, the facts of subordination on 



284 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

the one hand and of supremacy on the other will 
constitute the elements of permanent and universal 
harmony. Then the lion and the lamb will lie down 
together ; conflicts will cease, and the brotherhood 
of humanity will be supplemented and co-ordinated 
with the brotherhood of existence. 

The man who does not recognize the handiwork 
of God in the lower animals, and does not sympa- 
thize with God in his regard for them, does not 
bear in his bosom the highest elements of thought, 
of inspiration, and character. Strike from the hu- 
man mind this noble tendency, and how many po- 
ems, and paintings, and sculptures are lost. Take 
from the beautifully sympathetic heart of Rosa Bon- 
heur her love of animals, and her immortal pencil 
falls to the ground. We cannot spare the birds, nor 
the dogs, nor the horses, nor the fishes that swim in 
the sea. Why is it that the stranger, ascending the 
summit of the Capitoline Hill in Rome, and behold- 
ing the wonderful equestrian statue which ancient 
art has erected there, finds his eye and his admiring 
thought directed as much to the majestic and in- 
spiring attitude of the horse, as to that of the impe- 
rial Caesar who bestrides him ? I saw the dust of 
Wellington carried to its tomb, and in the long pro- 
cession composed of the eminent men of England, a 
place was 'reverently left for the horse of the con- 



ESSENTIAL LIFE REACHES ALL EXISTENCES. 285 

queror ; and as he walked alone, amid the sound of 
melancholy trumpets, he divided the sympathy of 
the multitude with their sorrows for his fallen mas- 
ter. The horse of Alexander, the Macedonian con- 
queror, has his place in history ; and the historic rec- 
ord, recognizing the ties of higher and lower forms of 
existence, has narrated in more than one instance, 
the affection and devotedness of the faithful dog ; 
and statuary has erected monuments to his mem- 
ory. 

Allow me to close with an incident, which made 
a strong impression upon me. A few years ago I 
read in the newspapers that a little girl in the town 
of Hingham, in Massachusetts, had tamed the fishes 
in a small lake near her father's residence. I came 
to the little girl's home, which was near the small 
lake or pond. Knocking at the door, and making 
such apology as I was able for a visit so early, I re- 
marked to the mother, that I had come for the pur- 
pose of seeing the fishes, over which her little 
daughter was said to have obtained a remarkable 
control. Readily accepting my explanations, she 
pointed to a place on the brink of the water, and 
said that her daughter would soon come down there. 
I had not stood there long before a little girl, appar- 
ently anxious not to detain me, came running down. 
Seating herself on a rock near the shore, she called 



286 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

aloud to the fishes ; calling them sometimes by the 
names of their tribes, and sometimes by particular 
names which she had given them. There was one, 
a large one in which she was particularly interested, 
which she called Cato. But Cato either did not 
hear her, or was not in a hurry to come. She made 
an apology for the fishes, saying that it was earlier 
than she had been in the habit of calling them, and 
that they had not yet left their places of slumber. 
But repeating still more loudly the invitation of her 
sweet voice, they soon began to make their appear- 
ance. The smaller ones came first, and then the 
larger ones of many varieties ; and at last Cato, who 
was a sort of king and counsellor in this finny con- 
gregation, came among them. Delighted with this 
renewed visit of their virgin queen, although they 
seemed to be conscious it was rather early in the 
morning, they thrust their heads above the water ; 
and she fed them from her hand. And I fed them 
also. 

Observing something peculiar at a little distance 
in the water, I was surprised to see two turtles 
making their way towards her. Her voice of affec- 
tion had penetrated beneath their dark hard shells. 
And I noticed that they came with great effort and 
zeal ; as if afraid of being too late at this festival of 
love. One of them, as soon as they reached the 



ESSENTIAL LIFE REACHES ALL EXISTENCES. 287 

shore, scrambled out of the water, and climbed 
upon the rock beside her, and she fed them both. 
I shall not easily forget this interesting scene ; this 
little episode of millenial humanity. 

THE MAIDEN FISH-TAMER. 

Oh maiden of the woods and wave, 

With footsteps in the morning dew ! 
From oozy bed and watery cave, 

The tenants of the lake who drew, 
Thy voice of love the mystery knew, 
Which makes old bards and prophets true. 

They tell us of that better day, 

When love shall rule the world again ; 

When crime and fraud shall pass away, 
And beast and bird shall dwell with men , 

When seas shall marry with the land, 

And fishes kiss a maiden's hand. 

The iron age has done its best 

With trump and sword and warriors slain ; 

Bnt could not tame the eagle's nest, 
Nor lead the lion by the mane ; 

With all its strength and all its woe, 

There was an art it did not know. 

'Twas fitting, that a maid like thee, 
In childhood's bright and happy hour, 

Should teach the world the mystery, 
That white-rob'd innocence has power; 

That love the victory can gain, 

Which is not won by millions slain. 



CHAPTER XXXIII. 

The Power of the Essential or True Life. 

Our principal object in this chapter is the con- 
sideration of the Power of the true life, not in its 
philosophy but in its practical results ; not in its 
highest and primal manifestations, which in some 
degree transcend human insight, but in its subor- 
dinate manifestations, and particularly as it is mani- 
fested in men. The methods in which it manifests 
itself are very various. In the case of the Christian 
orator, for instance, it will sometimes, under the in- 
spiration of essential life, speak in terms of rich and 
glowing eloquence, matching and more than match- 
ing the standards of the world's great masters ; but 
not less frequently its words are few and simple; 
perhaps an apothegm or a parable, but coming from 
the well-spring of the life, they touch the hearts of 
the people, and open the fountains of living salva- 
tion. And what is remarkable, it is sometimes the 
case, that the absolute silence of the man of God 



PO WER OF ESSENTIAL OR TR UE LIFE. 



289 



will have more effect than the noisy declamation of 
the man who is without God. Power goes out of 
him as it went out of Jesus. If it speaks in the 
mighty words of Paul and Apollos, it speaks also in 
the silence of a loving John, when he leans his head 
on a brother's bosom. What more effective and 
touching eloquence than that of the Son of Man, 
when, in the midst of a stormy and cruel tribunal, 
he "uttered not a word ; " and the Roman governor, 
struck with this sublime disregard of the precedents 
of a worldly life, "marveled greatly." And there 
are some specific modifications of the great variety 
of its forms, which are worthy of notice. One of 
the most remarkable things pertaining to the Power 
of the Life, is, that it manifests itself often, not by 
the antagonism of the same forces, as when we meet 
evil with evil and return blow for blow, as when 
sword clashes with sword and cannon rebounds to 
cannon ; but conquers the violence that attacks it, by 
the resistance and antagonism of what is found in 
the opposite. The stormy cloud is melted by the 
sunbeam ; the lion is tamed and led captive by the 
lamb ; and the little child plays, with its life and 
beauty unharmed, on the cockatrice's den. In all 
this there is a deep philosophy, which transcends 
the conceptions of a heart, that knows no higher 



290 



ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 



school than that of a self-hood which excludes the 
living God. 

And now w T e will say further, coming more with- 
in the practical sphere of the subject, that the Pow- 
er of the Life, that form of power which pierces and 
breaks the stony hearts of men, and is blessed of 
God in the great matter of renovating and purifying 
their perverted natures, is not found greatly, if at 
all, in mere intellectualism. Many facts are a con- 
firmation of this. There are preachers who have 
eminently the gifts of perception and reasoning, but 
have little influence with the masses. Even if at 
certain times their reasonings harmonize with the 
truth they produce, and can produce but little ef- 
fect, so long as the soul from which they come, is 
felt by the hearers to' contradict in experience, what 
their reasonings affirm and try to prove as a princi- 
ple. Again, the element of vitalizing power is not 
found in every form of mere emotionality ; we refer 
particularly to what may be called aesthetic emo 
tionality. There are preachers, and other profess 
edly religious teachers, who add to intellectual pow 
ers a cultivated taste, and adorn their reasoning 
with the arts of rhetoric. Their sermons, consid- 
ered as the exercises of intellect or the imagination, 
enlist the curiosity of men and please their fancy, 
but have little living power. There was a Ger- 



POWER OF ESSENTIAL OR TRUE LIFE. 



291 



man preacher of the 14th century — we refer to the 
justly celebrated John Tauler of Cologne, who 
stood unmatched in learning and in intellectual and 
aesthetic eloquence, but he had little power and 
influence, at least in a way which satisfied his con- 
viction of what ought to be the result, until he was 
led into the way of truth and life, by a poor, uncul- 
tured man of the people, whom as one of the weak 
and despised things of the world, God had chosen 
and made the instrument of this mighty influence. 
The few unlearned men, who went forth from Jeru- 
salem in the beginning of the Christian era, were 
not allowed to go until they were endued with pow- 
er from on high. They were commanded by Christ, 
" that they should not depart from Jerusalem, but 
wait for the promise of the Father," which was un- 
derstood in its fulfillment to be the baptism of the 
Holy Spirit. And then it was added : " Ye shall 
receive power after that the Holy Ghost is come 
upon you." Endowed with this great gift, this 
small band of early laborers and martyrs, without 
the prestige of position or scholarship, went forth to 
the mighty work which was appointed them ; and 
though the strife was long, and in many cases 
crowned with great suffering and death, they were 
found more than a match for the proud philosophers, 
the arts, and the institutions of that trying time. 



292 



ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 



That power is the same now that it was then ; that 
divine power is now as it always has been, the re- 
served force and inspiration of the world's progress 
and salvation ; but it lies hidden in the life. The 
life is God in the soul ; and the power of God 
always goes with it. 

There comes in connection with these remarks, 
the remembrance of a man, whose life of love and 
self-sacrificing labors strengthens and illustrates 
them. I remember him well. He lived and labored 
in the early part of this century in the State of 
Maine — a man without the advantages of a public 
education, but who had but one thought, one feel- 
ing, that of the glory of God and the salvation of 
men — the Oberlin of the American woods. He 
wandered through the forests ; he crossed lakes and 
rivers ; he went from house to house among the 
poor and ignorant, in summer's heat and winter's 
snows ; he preached in barns and school-houses, and 
in the remote, rude dwellings of the woods, and 
wherever he could find people who were ready to 
hear ; fulfilling more than half a century of labors, 
up to the very limit of human faith and human en- 
durance. Such was our loved and venerated Father 
Sewall. God was with him in power. 

I was once connected with a church of great in- 
telligence and not wanting in piety; some of whose 



POWER OF ESSENTIAL OR TRUE LIFE. 



293 



members have held high political positions, and 
others have been distinguished for attainments in 
science ; but of all the members of this truly leading 
and useful church, the one who was thought to exert 
the most religious influence, and is to this day per- 
haps exerting the most influence, through the account 
which is published of her life, was a poor negro wo- 
man, who in her childhood was a slave. She dwelt 
alone. During a period of eighteen years, she sup- 
ported herself by washing and ironing for the stu- 
dents in the neighboring college. And judged by 
all outward measurements and incidents, and as the 
world commonly judges, nothing could have been 
lower in prestige, or lower in position. But her 
heart was the dwelling-place of Christ. Her great 
familiarity with the Bible, the spirit of prayer which 
seemed always to be present with her, her gentle and 
wise words of discreet and thoughtful encourage- 
ment, her peace which flowed like a river, her sub- 
lime and forgiving charity which never failed — these 
beautiful and great results of a living principle in 
the soul, made her known and felt as a mighty power 
of God for many years. She was spoken of both in 
the Church and in the community around, under the 
name of " Happy Phebe ; " and the interesting 
tract, published by the American Tract Society, 
giving some account of her character and labors, 



294 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

still preserves her precious memory, and perpetuates 
the power of her holy life. 

One instance more, which illustrates in a peculiar 
manner the resources of God in raising up instru- 
ments for his purposes, where human wisdom would 
not be likely to look for them. I once knew a poor 
woman. In early life we were near neighbors. 
Time passed on ; and she heard of the slave, his 
toils, his sufferings, and his terrible bondage, con- 
tinued for centuries. It moved her heart to the 
very foundations of her being ; and the world called 
her insane. Being at a certain time in the city of 
Boston, where through the aid of a near relative she 
had found an humble abode, and touched by the re- 
membrance of early days as well as by Christian 
sympathy, I sought the place of her residence. It 
was a Sabbath day, and to my astonishment I found 
the street opposite to her house filled with people, 
listening respectfully and earnestly ; and from an 
upper window, this poor woman, the world's outcast, 
uttering terrible truths, with the burning energy of 
the words of the ancient prophets. I listened with 
the multitude ; and when she had concluded, I 
went to her room, and seated by her side we talked 
of the slave, whose sorrows had become her own 
soul's sorrows ; and we talked also of our early days, 



POWER OF ESSENTIAL OR TRUE LIFE. 



>95 



and of the joys and sorrows of our little neighbor- 
hood. 

And in the conversation I had painful evidence 
that her mind was shaken ; and that there was to 
some extent, a foundation for what had been said of 
her insanity. In leaving her my heart was strangely 
and profoundly affected. I said to myself, how won- 
derful are the mysteries of Providence. To-day, 
with temples, rich in architectural beauty, and 
preachers learned in theologies and worldly science, 
their lips comparatively sealed on this great subject 
of slavery ; and God, as if to put worldly wisdom to 
shame, has chosen a poor woman, reduced almost to 
beggary, without the advantages of education, and 
with the intellect injured and broken by sorrows, to 
utter His eternal truths, and to shatter the founda- 
tions of the gates of hell. 

The man who has the power of God in his soul, 
will not feel much troubled when told that certain- 
false philosophies, whether found in Germany, in 
France, in England, or in any other countries, will 
overthrow the religion of Christ. The world and 
its wisdom may leave us ; and we can easily afford 
to part company with them ; but we cannot under 
any circumstances, dispense with the power of the 
Life. Let the friends of the divine truth, who are 
girding on their armor for the last great conflict, re- 
13' 



296 



ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 



member that everything which appeared in Christ as 
the " Son of Man," and was possessed and mani- 
fested in His incarnation, is brought within the 
sphere of humanity, and has become humanity's 
eternal and mighty possession. Whatever Christ did 
as the " Son of Man," any other son of man can do, 
of whom it can be said, as the Apostle Paul said of 
himself, " I live ; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me." 
He can heal the sick, can cast out devils, can open 
prison doors, can tread on serpents and not be hurt, 
and most and mightiest of all, can become the in- 
strument of imparting the Holy Ghost, and of heal- 
ing the diseases of the mind. Therefore, we believe 
that God will raise up instruments when emergencies 
arise, and that, if the rich reject Him, Fie will choose 
the poor, and if the' learned reject Him, He will take 
the ignorant, and if the strong reject Him, He will 
make friends of the weak ; and pouring into the ves- 
sels of poverty, ignorance and weakness, the mighty 
powers which are lodged in the bosom of essential 
and Eternal Life, He will triumphantly complete the 
work of redemption. And Christ on the throne, 
and Christ in the soul of man, Christ in heaven and 
Christ on earth, shall hold the sceptre of dominion 
and shall reign forever and ever. 



CHAPTER XXXIV. 

Locality of God and the Divine Moment — Personal 

Experience. 

At a certain time, in the course of my inward 
personal history, I found myself in a state of inward 
desolation, such as I had seldom and perhaps never 
experienced before. God seemed to be hidden from 
my view. Christ as a distinct object of conception 
was withdrawn. I found nothing of that familiar 
and delightful access to the great Source of Life, 
whether denominated God or Christ, to which I had 
been accustomed. The beautiful ministry, or what 
seemed to be such, of angelic and spiritual presences 
had departed. And in addition to this, there seem- 
ed to be a weakening and disruption of the ties 
which bound me to many of my earthly friends. 
Both inwardly and outwardly my condition was one 
of vacuity and deprivation, which apparently wanted 
nothing to its completeness. It reminded me of 
what I had once known in the deserts of Sinai, 
where, standing on the tops of the highest moun- 



298 



ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 



tains, I beheld around me nothing but the rugged 
cliffs ; no tree, no flower, no running brook, no sing- 
ing bird. 

Finding myself in this arid and painful condition 
of things, which perhaps for the sake of convenience 
may be denominated, in the language of the old 
mystics, the " spiritual wilderness," I remained for a 
time in a sort of amazement : unable to understand 
its nature or its meaning. At last arousing from 
the inactivity and confusion of spirit which natu- 
rally attended it, I ventured in my supplications to 
ask the Lord, what was the cause of these unlooked- 
for experiences, and what the instruction which He 
wished me to derive from them ; for I knew, al- 
though He was hidden in great and unprecedented 
mystery, He must be somewhere, where He could 
listen to the sound of my voice. For a time no re- 
sponsive utterance came ; neither to the outward 
ear where I did not look for it; nor to the interior 
of the soul, where I had often heard it, in sugges- 
tions and inspirations which left no doubt of the di- 
vinity of their origin. 

After such a time as seemed to be necessary to 
impress me fully with the fact of this great desola- 
tion, and also to train my heart to the unwavering 
acceptance of it, as a condition of things which had 
■its significancy and its results, and to dwell quietly 



LOCALITY OF GOD AND DIVINE MOMENT. 



299 



like a child at home amid its clouds and darkness, I 
received from time to time, and through those inte- 
rior sources which the Holy Spirit knows how to 
open and employ, such intimations and teachings as 
became afterwards of great spiritual value to myself, 
and perhaps also to others, although I am aware 
that inward experiences are very various, and that 
it is best to let God do with us just what He 
pleases. 

In the first place, it was vividly recalled to mind, 
as a part of the inward teaching of those trying but 
instructive days, that, in consequence of the finite 
nature of the human mind, all things and all events 
are and must be made known, not by one broad 
and all-embracing perceptivity, but in successive 
moments of time. God knows all things simultane- 
ously; but it requires I think not much argument 
to show, inasmuch as the statement carries with it 
its own evidence, that the finite mind, bounded by 
the limit of its own finiteness, can know only by a 
gradual uplifting of the veil of the future, and in 
these successive moments. And it was made clear 
also, in the course of these inward teachings, that 
this view, in consequence of the relations existing 
among them, had reference to place as well as to 
time ; and that neither successions in place, nor 
successions in events, nor changes of any kind, could 



300 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

take place and be made the subjects of knowledge 
in any other way. And hence came an additional 
teaching, based upon these general views, that we 
are to find the true locality of God, not in any im- 
agined distant heavens where I had been in the 
habit of looking for Him, and thus localizing Him 
by my own will or choice, but that we must rather 
recognize Him, as already present by the very ne- 
cessities of his nature, in everything which exists or 
takes place within the sphere of our knowledge ; 
and that knowledge comes to us under the suc- 
cessive revelations of successive moments. In other 
words, the present moment, more than all others 
and above all others, is the divine moment ; and 
that the state of things, which is then made present 
to us, whether it be in the form of places or objects, 
or persons or events, constitutes to us the only true 
and available locality of the Divine Nature. We 
must meet God there, or meet Him nowhere. It 
is therefore a great and glorious truth, that the 
principle of the Universe, which we sometimes call 
the Divine Life of the Universe, is HERE and NOW ; 
that in the moment which now is, and nowhere else, 
the great Life and Spirit of all things, always the 
same and yet always changing, meets us face to 
face, in every man that we meet ; in every flower; 
in every tree and plant and insect and animal ; in 



LOCALITY OF GOD AND DIVINE MOMENT. 



30I 



every joy and sorrow ; in all good and all evil ; in 
all clouds and all sunshine ; in all blessings and all 
curses ; in all angels and all devils ; in all virtues 
and all crimes. So that it will always be found, if 
we are out of position with the present moment, 
either in the posture of our feelings or the error of 
our acts, we lose something of God, by losing some- 
thing of that knowledge which the present moment 
brings. 

And again, there was this additional and most 
important teaching: The recognition of God in the 
divine moment is, in the first instance and necessa- 
rily, the recognition of Him as an objective or out- 
ward God. But this outward manifestation of God, 
or better, perhaps, this recognition of Him as hav- 
ing a fixed and present relation to the thing or 
event of the moment, calls forth the God subjective 
or the God in our own souls. The God sincerely 
recognized without, and the God actually existing 
within', — using expressions which are adapted to 
man's imperfect methods of thought, — may be re- 
garded as always correlative and correspondent to 
each other. And accordingly, if the event or fact 
which the present moment reveals to us is one of 
kindness, it calls forth in our own souls the divine 
element of gratitude; if the event be one of sorrow, 
it calls forth, in correspondence with the outward 



302 



ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 



occasion, the spiritual graces of submission and pa- 
tience ; if the thing or event be of the nature of a 
persecution, it is corresponded to by feelings of for- 
bearance and forgiveness. The result of this com- 
plex occasion, characterized by the objective on the 
one side and by the subjective on the other, is, that 
God outward is revealed through outward facts, and 
that God in the soul is revealed through inward feel 
ings. 

Meeting together under a providential arrange- 
ment, which has respect equally to both, they fur- 
nish reciprocally the conditions and incitements of 
development and action. So that the instruc- 
tion revealed during the period of this singular and 
trying experience, when compared and adjusted in 
all its parts, seems to have been this — with a 
heart devoted to God and full of God, no longer 
seek Him in the heavens above or the earth be- 
neath, or in the things under the earth, nor in any 
locality which has the effect to restrict his name 
and limit his existence, but recognize Him as the 
great fact of the universe, separate from no place or 
part, but revealed in all places and in all things and 
events, moment by moment. And as eternity alone 
will exhaust this momentary revelation, which has 
sometimes been called the ETERNAL Now, thou 
shalt thus find God ever present and ever new ; and 



LOCALITY OF GOD AND DIVINE MOMENT. 303 

thy soul shall adore Him and feed upon Him in the 
things and events which each new moment brings ; 
and thou shalt never be absent from Him and He 
shall never be absent from thee. 

Let us take an illustration : It happens as we 
are walking the streets, that we unexpectedly meet 
with a man who approaches us with words and 
deeds of violence. He meets us in the present mo- 
ment and at no other. It is a necessity that God 
comes with him ; because God, by the necessities 
of existence, resides in him physically, inasmuch as 
He made him and sustains him. And if, in conse- 
quence of the moral freedom which divine goodness 
has made his inalienable birthright, it is not possible 
for God to be in him as the originator of his vio- 
lence and injustice, He is, nevertheless, present in 
his providences. In other words, He is present in 
the arrangement and issue of events, which at that 
particular moment, in distinction from any other 
moment and any other circumstances, presents the 
man before us. He practically brings him into our 
presence with all the evidences of his rebellion and 
wickedness ; the man is where he is because God 
directs him to be there ; and He does it, in all prob- 
ability, in order that this wicked man may HERE 
and NOW, under the overshadowings of the divine 
moment, be judged and condemned; and that, if it 



304 



ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 



be possible, he may be made anew and saved. And 
this last is done, and possibly it is the special and 
great object which God had in view in his provi- 
dences, first, by the manifestation of God in our own 
consciousness in feelings of which He is the author, 
and also by outward signs and words expressive of 
the inward feelings, given forth by the divine power 
within us in the divine moment. So that we stand 
up in the presence of this or any other form of wick- 
edness, and we stand there in a great divine pur- 
pose, in the outward manifestation of the inward 
Christ, or if any one prefers it, of the inward Christ 
spirit, in patience and forbearance, in meekness and 
pity, with kind words for words of violence, and 
with love for hatred. And thus looking for God, 
finding Him, not thousands of miles off in place and 
' thousands of years hence in time, but as He is re- 
vealed in the correlated and correspondent facts 
and incidents of each successive moment, we shall 
know experimentally that He becomes now, and 
that, in the continuous application and issue of this 
great principle, He becomes always, a presence and 
a power, a source of goodness to ourselves and of 
goodness to others, and with a recognized dwelling- 
place, which has its center in our own hearts and its 
circumference in the objects and events, including 
their necessary relations, which the present moment 



LOCALITY OF GOD AND DIVINE MOMENT. 305 

reveals. Such to finite beings is the true locality 
of God. Previously to this time and the instruc- 
tions of this experience, I had intellectually learned 
and known this great principle and law of the divine 
presence. But in consequence of the unfavorable 
influence of early habits of thought and feeling, it 
became necessary to restore both the vividness of 
the inward conviction, and to readjust and intensify 
it as a rule of life. And it was for this, so far as I 
was led to understand it, that I was led into the 
desert. And it was thus, that losing God in one di- 
rection, I found Him in another; and have learned, 
that, if I am faithful to these instructions, and will 
not get out of His way as He confronts me in the 
mighty march of time and events, I can nevermore 
lose Him. 

In connection with what has been said, we stop 
at this point to make a remark in relation to inte- 
rior solitude, and what is known in experimental 
writers of the earliest ages as inward aridness or vas- 
tation. Such a state is not without its benefits. In 
ancient Egypt, amid its wealth and intellectual ad- 
vancement, the Hebrews learned much ; they be- 
came masters, like the people among whom they 
dwelt, of arts and letters, of which their own re- 
corded history is a proof; but the arts they learned 
and the knowledge they acquired, were worldly arts 



306 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

and worldly knowledge. In the terrible desert, 
through which they were led when they came out 
of Egypt, they obtained knowledge of a different 
kind, knowledge of a higher aspect and character, 
and far more valuable. Accordingly in reading their 
travels through the desert, we feel that we are read- 
ing, if we are interiorly enlightened, the travels of 
the human heart ; that we are becoming acquainted 
with the mighty pilgrimage of the soul ; its liability 
to error, its temptations, its sorrows, its progress in 
knowledge and goodness ; and also the divine rela- 
tions which exist between the lawgiver and those 
under the law, and the difference between the life 
moulded by obedience to law and the disordered 
and ruined life which, is the result of its violation. 
The Hebrews learned as much and probablymuch 
more, certainly much more that was valuable, during 
their pilgrimage of forty years in the desert, than 
during their four hundred years of residence among 
the most enlightened people which the world had ever 
seen. Can we not say then that the voice of wis- 
dom found an utterance in the wilderness ? And so 
in the solitudes and deserts of the spirit, when in- 
teriorly we are led away from the land of flowers to 
the rude habitations of the sands and rocks, the 
land where smiles are exotics and joy is a stranger, 
there remains to us, nevertheless, much of inward 



LOCALITY OF GOD AND DIVINE MOMENT. 



307 



compensation. It is not "without a great purpose, 
that our bruised and bleeding feet are smitten upon 
the rocks. The voice of wisdom is heard in the 
desolate wilderness of the soul. Such is the teach- 
ing of national history. Such is the testimony, also, 
of the deeply interior men of all ages ; of Moses 
and Elijah ; of Christ, when led into the wilderness 
to be tempted of satan ; of John the Baptist, whose 
rugged nature found a congeniality with desolation 
within and desolation without ; of St. Jerome, and 
of Augustine, as recorded in his confessions ; of 
Tauler, the philosopher, mystic, and revivalist of the 
middle ages ; of St. John of the Cross, one of the 
great explorers of the spiritual wilderness ; of John 
Bunyan, the outward and inward sufferer and great 
traveller in interior lands ; of George Fox and Wil- 
liam Penn ; of many of the leaders and followers in 
the Protestant Reformation ; of the early Methodists 
and Puritans ; of all in all nations and of all names, 
who have neither the power nor the inclination to go 
to heaven on u flowery beds of ease." 

But returning from the method of learning to the 
things which have been taught, we proceed further 
to say, that one of the marked things of this form 
of experience, which we will characterize now as 
LIVING BY THE MOMENT, is, that it is infinitely 
varied. Change, which is evidently incidental to the 



308 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

great fact of growth or progression, is one of the 
great necessities of existence. It is moreover one 
of those things, which in any true philosophy of the 
universe, will be found to lie at the foundation of 
the great problem of what constitutes the highest 
amount of human happiness, and in what way such 
happiness shall be realized. Meeting God in the 
moment of God, which is necessarily the present 
moment, we shall meet Him always the same but 
always new ; always unchanged in his essence, but 
changing always in his incidents. The divine mo- 
ment, lifting as it emerges into being the veil that 
rests upon forms and places and actions and events, 
opens that little eyelid of eternity, and reveals God, 
not in a perpetual identity of manifestation which 
would tire our perception and annul our growth, but 
in all possible varieties. He stands before us some- 
times in the storm and sometimes in the sunshine; 
sometimes in the waste howling wilderness, and 
sometimes in the field of flowers ; in the palace and 
the prison, in friendship and enmity ; in joy and 
sorrow. And thus He is always revealing, step by 
step, in harmony with the nature and extent of our 
own capacities, the infinitudes of existence ; and al- 
ways affording new elements of knowledge, new 
tests of strength, and new foundations and applian- 
ces of growth and happiness. 



LOCALITY OF GOD AND DIVINE MOMENT. 



309 



And it may further be remarked as something 
worthy of notice, and as closely connected with 
what has just been said, that those who live in the 
divine moment are relieved in a great degree from 
the perplexity of conjectures and calculations, and 
cannot be said, in the usual sense of the terms, to 
have plans of action. It is certain that they do not 
have any, in the unconditioned or absolute sense. 
Being in harmony inwardly and outwardly with the 
facts of the present moment, it is the law of their 
condition, that they shall do the work which it is 
given them to do. Under the mastery of the pres- 
ent, they see the objects that are now before them ; 
they obey the orders which are now given ; and ac- 
complish wnat now is, and nothing else. 

It is impossible that the man who lives thus 
should have any plans which are exclusively his 
own ; any plans which are separate from the pur- 
pose and the will of God. He cannot be in har- , 
mony with the present moment without being in 
harmony with the will of God, as manifested in the 
present moment ; and the divine will, thus mani- 
fested, necessarily constitues the condition to which 
all his actions and plans of action are subordinated. 
So that it can justly be said in this view of things, 
that the mind of the Infinite is substituted for his 
own, and that God plans for him. Submitting his 



310 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

own wisdom to the higher wisdom which is from 
above, he can say in the spirit of Christ, whose 
plan of action was established in eternity and was 
unchangeable, that he " comes to do the will of the 
Father who sent him." 

And hence it is that one great sign of the prac- 
tical recognition of the " divine moment " and of 
our finding God's habitation in it, is constant calm- 
ness and peace of mind. Events and things come 
with the moment ; but God comes with them too. 
And He comes, written all over with the divinity 
of wisdom and the glory of the promises. So that 
if He comes in the sunshine, we find rest and joy; 
and if He comes in the storm, we know He is King 
of the storms, and our hearts are not troubled. 
God himself, though possessing a heart filled with 
the tenderest feelings, is, nevertheless, an everlast- 
ing tranquillity ; and when Ave enter into His holy 
tabernacle, his great movable tent, which is travel- 
ling here and there under the shifting footsteps of 
moment added to moment, our souls necessarily en- 
ter into the tabernacle of.rest. 

And let it be added here, that the doctrine of 
living by the moment suggests one of the prepara- 
tory conditions, and furnishes in part, a philosophi- 
cal explanation of the great doctrine of inward 
inspiration. Inspiration, looking at the fact of the 



LOCALITY OF GOD AND DIVINE MOMENT. 



311 



thing as well as the etymology of the term, is the 
in-breathing or the in-flowing of the Infinite into 
the finite. And if we stand in the openings of the 
present moment, with all the length and breadth of 
our faculties unselfishly adjusted to what it reveals, 
we are in the best condition to receive what God is 
always ready to communicate. So that there is not 
merely a dogmatical affirmation, which is to be be- 
lieved solely because it is affirmed, but an interior 
and divine philosophy in those suggestive and spir- 
itual words of Jesus : " And when they bring you 
unto the synagogues, and unto magistrates and 
powers, take ye no thought how or what thing ye 
shall answer or what ye shall say ; for the Holy 
Ghost shall teach you in the same hour what ye 
ought to say." 

Each moment of time is one of the successive 
and separate letters of the alphabet, which go to 
make up the great book of eternity. And eternity 
being the sum of all* moments, and therefore the res- 
idence or locality of God in the higher sense, we are 
thus learning the letters of that book in which will 
be written out all truths of the Infinite, and all 
truths and destinies for ourselves. To lose a mo- 
ment by being out of harmony with the facts and 
requisitions of the moment, is to lose a letter out of 

the great book, and thus to lose something of its 
14 



312 ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 

infinite and eternal meanings. It was thus that 
God taught me while I was in the spiritual wilder- 
ness. I was thus enabled to see, and perhaps more 
clearly than others will be likely to do, who have 
not passed through the same inward history, why 
He shut the old gateways and vistas of spiritual 
knowledge, which were suited to the beginnings of 
. inward experience, and required me to meet with 
Him and to dwell with Him in the Eternal Now. 
It was one of the lessons of the desert ; but the 
desert, I mean the spiritual desert, is one of the 
school-houses of the soul. And as soon as I had 
learned the lesson, which it seems to have been the 
object of the school of the desert to teach, the 
cloud was gradually lifted ; the sunshine came down 
upon the rocks ; the sands and pebbles grew up into 
flowers ; I found the shepherd sitting beside the 
still waters; and I came up out of the entangle- 
ments of the wilderness into a firmer position and a 
clearer light than I had ever known before. 



THE END. 



ft *>' 



